Mass Effect: Redemption
by C. Dawgz
Summary: ATTENTION- TITLE CHANGE IMINENT! Two years after the events of Mass Effect, former Lt. Kaidan Alenko is a broken man. Haunted by nightmares of the mission on Virmire and wracked with survivor’s guilt, can a new assignment give him the peace he craves?
1. The Bottom of the Bottle

**_Let it be known that I do not own Mass Effect, its characters, or any of the song quotations at the beginning of chapters._**

Mass Effect: Redemption

Chapter One: The Bottom of the Bottle

_Only the good die young...all the evil seems to live forever-_ Iron Maiden

_You know when I drink alone, I prefer to be by myself- _George Thorogood

"Why?"

It was a simple question, a question he had asked himself many times in the wake of the Geth War, as the short conflict was now called. Now she was asking him, and he was at a loss for words. What could he say that would in any way improve the situation? What could he say to justify what had happened?

She asked again. "Why did you kill me?"

He began to speak, to tell her that it hadn't been his fault, but the words died in his throat. He had already killed her. There was no need to add lying to his list of transgressions. "I don't know, Chief. I'm so sorry," was all he could manage.

She glowered angrily at him, eyes narrowing and arms folding across her chest. She was exactly as he remembered her, clad in the casual short-sleeved shirt and pants of an Alliance crewman. "Sorry? Sorry? That's gonna cut it? You kill me and apologize and suddenly everything's fine? It should have been you, Alenko! You killed me and then you happily took Shepard to bed and carried on like your relationship _wasn't_ the reason Shepard went back for you!"

"Not a day goes by when I don't wish it was me, Chief. Not a goddamn day."

"Well, it wasn't you. You and Shepard go on to make intergalactic whoopee and who gives a damn about ol' Ashley Williams? Didn't she get nuked? Y'know, I can't remember for the life of me!" The same old Williams sarcasm remained, even in death. Kaiden Alenko fondly remembered such sarcasm, from an Ashley Williams who had not yet been incinerated on a backwater planet by a bomb that he had armed.

"Chief…I'm sorry. I was the one who had to tell your family. I chose to do it, actually. Thought it might bring me some closure. I even presented your Star of Terra posthumously to your little sister. Sarah, was it? She's strong. Didn't cry, just kept her composure. Stronger than me. I cried. Damn it, Ashley. I'm sorry."

He felt tears coming, and hated himself for it. The logical, reasoning side of Kaiden Alenko knew that Shepard had made the right tactical decision. He was a Lieutenant. She was a Gunnery Chief. She was a diversion. He was with the nuke that the entire operation depended on. Tactically, Rebecca Shepard had done everything right. Why did it feel so wrong?

"Enough, Alenko. Enough. Nothing you say to me is going to change the fact that you're alive and well and I'm so much dust on Virmire. I hope that keeps you up at night, you son of a bitch." He was about to reply, when all of a sudden gunshot wounds began to blossom in her chest at an alarming rate, spilling the woman's blood. She lurched backwards and sneered at him, finally disintegrating into a pile of ashes at his feet.

"Ashley!" he shouted in anguish. "Ashleeeyyy!!"

Kaidan Alenko woke with the scream on his lips. He ran a hand across his sweat- drenched forehead and reached over to turn on the lamp by his bunk. The sheets were in tattered disarray about him, just as sweaty as he was. Alenko shuddered with the memory of the nightmare. He has had that nightmare far too many times. It was always the same, and it always left him shaken.

He climbed out of the bed and pulled on the pair of pants that had been lying on the floor next to it. Closure. Bullshit. He walked into his kitchen and rummaged through the dirty dishes in the sink for a glass that looked tolerable. Satisfied, he popped the top from a bottle of scotch and poured a shot. It was good scotch. He received enough credits for his exploits during the Geth War that if he wanted a little escapism, there was no need to settle for cheap Turian booze. His liquor was imported from Earth and Earth alone. He downed the shot and didn't even bother to fill the glass again, instead setting it down on the counter and bringing the bottle with him to the bathroom.

Alenko stopped at the bathroom counter and gazed into the mirror. "You're letting yourself go," he told his reflection before taking another swig. That was an understatement. Two years ago, Kaidan had been the type to pay meticulous attention to his appearance. With the nightmares and the drinking had come the apathy. Kaidan hadn't shaved in several days, hadn't had a haircut in several months, and had a permanent crook in his nose from a bar fight almost a year prior.

Why the hell was he alive? Why did he get to live when that thoroughly principled and decent young woman was dead? He scowled at the man in the mirror with narrowed eyes, breaking eye contact for a moment only to down the entire bottle, more than half-full, in one gulp. He tossed it into the living room and resumed glaring at his reflection.

"You piece of shit!" he roared, throwing a hard right hook at the mirror and breaking it, leaving a bloody impression where his fist collided with the glass. He roared again, this time with physical pain. Alenko pulled back on the window and went into the medicine cabinet behind it. "Do not take with alcohol," he thought ironically as he swallowed three of the tranquilizers dry. If his liver failed, it failed. He needed the alcohol to calm his nerves and he needed the pills for the same reason. Neither ever did the job entirely, but sometimes with both in his system he almost felt good.

Kaidan would be the first to admit the sorry state he was in. He knew he drank too much and he knew that he was slowly killing himself, but the alternative was dealing with Ashley's death sober, and that scared him a hell of a lot more than death.

He moved to put the pills back but thought better of it and took one more. Setting the meds down on the counter, he ran cold water over his bloody hand and wrapped a bandage from the cabinet around it. Alenko went back into the bedroom and put a shirt on. Back in the living room, he plopped down on the couch, new bottle of scotch in hand, and flicked on the news. The monitor lit up the darkened chamber as he took a gulp.

The blessed alcohol was beginning to take its numbing effect on him, and the edge of both his mental anguish and the wound on his hand began to blur. The news anchor was a Salarian, wide eyed and slender like the rest of his species. He recited from his teleprompter in a nasally voice. Kaidan let the words pass by him. He didn't care what was happening, but the background noise allowed him to space out. He smiled faintly at the pun as he looked out the living room window into the nebula. His apartment on the wards gave him a great view of the Citadel and the space surrounding it, but Kaidan was usually too drunk to appreciate it.

A pain emerged behind his eyes and he swore aloud. The L2 implants that powered the biotic abilities that he no longer had a use for had always caused migraines. Since he had begun abusing himself with booze and pills, the migraines had intensified. They weren't constant, but when they decided to make themselves known it was a hell of a thing. They emerged sporadically and the pain was immediate and intense.

Alenko had recently been considering going under the knife and having the L2s either removed or retrofitted to L3s. If he was no longer a soldier there was no need for such pain. It had been a long while since he had tried, but he doubted that his biotic ability had much of a kick anymore anyway.

"Screw it," he muttered through gritted teeth, taking a shot of liquor as the ache blossomed into a raging bastard of a migraine that felt as if it were going to rip its way out of his head.

Yes, life was not good for Kaidan Alenko. Migraines, substance abuse, and unemployment were a terrible combination for anyone to have to endure. The fact that they all stemmed from that one moment back in the tropics of Virmire tore him apart. Whether she knew it or not, Shepard had damned him by saving him. He would have rather died fighting the Geth, for a cause, than to live another day like this.

Suicide was technically an option of course, but it wasn't really one that appealed to him. He had been close once, his service pistol pressed to his temple and a bottle of whiskey in his hand not unlike the bottle of scotch he clutched so tightly now. It hadn't been fear that stayed his hand. The easy way out seemed like an unfair choice. Ashley hadn't had a choice, had died thousands of light-years from home on a pissant little backwater of a world while goddamned noble Rebecca Shepard raced to Kaidan's rescue.

Shepard. He wondered faintly what she was up to. Was she on an assignment even now, as he drank himself into a stupor on the couch of a cluttered apartment? He decided that he didn't care. Shepard wasn't part of his life any longer, as far as actual interaction was concerned. The fact that she had ruined him, however, stuck around where her physical being had not.

His head pounded with fierce intensity as he mulled over his existance. Setting the bottle down on the coffee table in front of the sofa, Kaidan climbed to his feet and walked back into the bedroom. He lowered himself back onto the bed, felt it creak a bit under the new strain, and tried to purge his mind of Rebecca Shepard and Ashley Williams. His mind, being a fickle bitch, refused to oblige him, even as sleep overcame him.

* * *

Garret Keller gave a final glance over his shoulder before entering the nightclub. Job like this, you couldn't be too careful, and it wouldn't do to pick up a tail this close to zero hour. The reassuring weight of his pistol bolstered his confidence as he brushed by an asari stripper's advance and approached the bar. The bar was circular, wrapping all the way around an elevated platform where another stripper was currently hanging upside down on a pole.

His server was a middle aged human male. "Can I get you something?"

Garret nodded consent, running a hand through his short red hair. "I'll have a beer. It doesn't matter which." He took the glass and the barkeep used an omni-tool to recieve the electronically transmitted credits.

Stepping back from the bar, his eyes roamed the club for what he was looking for. At a booth in the corner sat an odd trio. A large Krogan was hunched over a Salarian ale. Across from him sat a severe looking Turian and adjacent to the Turian was a badly scarred human male. Keller strode to the table and took the remaining seat next to the Krogan. The big alien glanced sideways at him and grunted derisively, turning back to his liquor.

The three wore combat armor not unlike Garret's own. The other human wore a black armor bodysuit. It wasn't thin and flimsly like Keller's own, but it probably made moving around a bit difficult for his taste. The Turian's armor was even bulkier, with large shoulderpads and thick plating. The lurking beast of an alien next to Garret wore armor similar to this, also heavy and probably a great deterrent to gunshots.

"Are you Keller?" the Turian asked skeptically. The severity Garret had sensed in him from afar was more apparent in close proximity. The alien carried himself rigidly, and his tone of voice suggested profound animosity towards the human. Keller didn't know a hell of a lot about Turian physiology, so he supposed it might be possible that the sentient across from him was a veteran of the First Contact War, but it was equally likely that Turian was far too young. Either way, it made sense that he might not be a fan of humanity. Not many E.T's were.

"Yeah. You're Vargan. So we're on for tonight, eh? What pushed up the timetable?" When Keller had recieved the order to move on the target on this very night, it had been with a healthy measure of caution and skepticism. He'd been in the game too long to make the mistake of ignoring any variables.

"Dunno," the scarred man, Ken Moss, replied. Moss had been in the game for a long time, and had the wounds to show it. His left eye was dead, a deep scar running down above it, through it, and down to just below his lip. Another scar ran across his right cheek. Even with these disfigurements, he seemed to be the most laid back of the men at the table. Ken Moss had been around the block a few times and it probably took a lot to knock him out of his good humor. "The boss is getting antsy, whoever the fuck he is. Hell, I don't even know what he wants this guy for."

Vargan shrugged his indifference. "It doesn't matter. I've already recieved the deposit. If that was a taste, I'm ready for the main course."

Moss grinned widely at the remark. "I hear that," he replied heartily. "So how do we wanna do this?"

Garret got a bad vibe from the whole operation. Information was on an uncomfortably tight leash, and not a single factor was in his control. Their mystery employer had revealed himself to them individually, four high priced freelancers, and hired them for what was ostensibly a simple kidnapping. The whole thing reeked of complications.

"Taking him alive is going to be a real bitch," Moss remarked off-handedly. "The Citadel's not an easy place to pull something like that off to begin with. Getting him off the station is going to be tight."

"There was a time when I wouldn't even consider a job like this ," the Turian replied. "Things are just easier when you're free to kill."

"I'm thinking riot slugs," Keller remarked, not acknowledging Vargan's comment but taking note that the alien was a possible dissenter. "They should take him down without taking him out."

The mercenaries planned the operation down to a tee over several drinks and three quarters of an hour. The krogan remained sedantary the entire time, reptilian eyes casting back and forth on his compatriots in an almost lazy complacency. It was decided that they would go straight from the diner. It was late at night and the target would probably be asleep. If they were lucky they could potentially get in and extract the subject without so much as a ruckus. This was all fine and dandy, Keller thought as they rose from the booth. Why did he get the feeling nothing was going to go as planned?

"Is everyone ready?" Vargan asked pointedly.

"Keller and I will do our jobs," Moss replied as he stretched his limbs. "You just focus on yours." An unspoken agreement between the two humans had developed during the conversation. They were of the same species and if the shit were to hit the proverbial fan, they'd have each other's backs. The Turian, however, was in all likelihood another story. As for the Krogan, Keller had no idea.

"Krogan?" Vargan asked, seeming to hear Garret's thoughts and echo them verbally. "Ready?"

"Yeah," the Krogan drawled in a gravelly voice. "I've been ready for the last hour."

"Didn't catch your name," the Turian said haughtily. Keller had nearly forgotten the animosity between the two races, but now the animosity in Vargan's voice made even more sense as he recalled the Krogan Rebellion.

The Krogan climbed out of the booth and stretched. "It's Wrex," he replied. "Urdnot Wrex."

**Author's Note**: This is my first ever fanfiction, but if it does happen to suck I actually want to hear constructive criticism. I'm hoping that its a pretty decent first effort.


	2. Home Invasion

Chapter 2: Home Invasion

Hi folks- It's been a while, but here's Chapter 2. I'm really enjoying writing this, and it gave me a chance to bust out my FemShep infiltrator to redo the Kaidan subplot and refresh my memory. Anyways, special thanks to Parle, Fegli, AFlockOfBunnies, and Mitheria for their reviews of Chapter 1. I appreciate any feedback I receive. Without further blathering, here's Mass Effect: Redemption, Chapter 2.

**Chapter 2: Home Invasion**

_Through it all the memories cling; 'til I can't sleep at night-Judas Priest_

_Your mother made a monster; now get the hell out of my house-Anthrax_

Kaidan woke up with less of a bang this time, but he was disappointed to see that it was still far too late (early?) to be up. The digital readout on the bureau next to his bed read 3:41. He swore under his breath, but didn't rise or reach for a drink as he had earlier. The migraine had subsided with sleep, in its place a miserable hangover.

He rolled over. The dream hadn't returned, probably because of the amount of toxic garbage he'd forced into his body four hours earlier, and for that he was thankful. The booze and the pills certainly did their jobs, Alenko thought. Were they not such an aid against the anguish he wallowed in, he certainly would not have allowed himself to fall so far.

What day was it? The realization that he didn't know was yet another thing to be depressed about. Who'd have thought it? Who could have predicted merely a few years ago that Kaidan Alenko, with his immaculate service record and classic good looks, with his easy charm and dedication to his duty and his comrades, would ever turn into such a miserable screw up? He certainly hadn't.

His immaculate service record and dedication to duty were down the shitter after he resigned from his job and had his ass kicked by a pair of Turians in a bar that very night. It had been a bad day. His charming, laid back manner had long been replaced with a wall of rock hard cynicism and biting sarcasm. When the highlight of your day was getting absolutely smashed so you didn't have to look at the blood on your hands, it was difficult to be anything but an asshole. The good looks weren't technically gone, but Alenko was far beyond caring enough to look good.

He hadn't talked to Shepard in more than a year. As far as Kaidan was concerned, a year wasn't nearly long enough. He didn't want to see her, didn't want to hear about her, didn't want to talk about her, and didn't want to think about her. This last desire was an unattainable one, as thoughts of Shepard were inextricable from thoughts of Ashley Williams and what Kaidan Alenko had done to her.

He found himself thinking about her a lot. He had loved her once; to be sure. Even for a while after Virmire, he had still loved her. Beautiful, intelligent, and driven, Rebecca Shepard was the kind of woman that men wanted, and he had had her.

"You make me feel human," he had told her an hour before the final conflict for the fate of the galaxy began. It was horribly ironic, really. A few short months later and she made him feel like a murderer.

He had never really understood why the Post-Traumatic Stress had taken so long to hit him. It had taken two months for the dreams to begin, and his state of mind snowballed from there.

He was offered a new job after the war as a sort of military liaison between the Alliance government and several groups of disenfranchised L2 biotics. The former liaison had been killed in the Citadel Tower when Saren had stormed the Council Chamber and the position was left open. Kaidan was an intelligent man with a better-than-average grasp on the political goings on of the Alliance, and his status as an L2 gave him a unique perspective into the plight of the biotics. He was also moderately famous for his role in the war, though Rebecca got most of the interviews.

Kaidan and Shepard had both agreed that he could do a lot of good for a group of people that sorely needed adequate representation in the government. The L2s had been hung out to dry, with little or no reparations given for the unethical testing, brutal training regiments, and real world persecution that they had faced, not to mention the frequent medical problems that arose due to the combination of unsafe implants and their prior exposure to Element Zero.

They bought an apartment in the wards. It was during this time that the survivors of the mercifully short battle took stock of the damage and the death toll. It really hadn't been as severe as it had seemed while it was going on. The majority of the carnage took place on the Presidium, where the mass relay from Ilos had led Saren's strike team. Since Saren's target was close, most of the slain were in the immediate area of the Citadel Tower, which itself was, for the most part, safely evacuated onto the _Destiny Ascension _as the Geth fought their way in.

There had also been death on the wards, but the majority of it resulted from falling debris from the fiendish _Sovereign _and other destroyed starships. All in all, the losses had been minimal.

The following month or so was pleasant enough for Kaidan. He and Shepard had spent much of the time in bed, and there were numerous social events toasting their achievements after the bulk of the repairs were completed.

It was only when Shepard left on a seven month long assignment that things started to deteriorate. The adrenaline of saving the galaxy had subsided and the afterglow was fading. Only then was Kaidan able to see the events on Virmire with true clarity. The time apart from Shepard gave the mental wounds a chance to fester, and soon Kaidan was held tightly in the clutches of the fabled Vietnam Syndrome, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. He began to resent his lover, even hate her, for the choice she had made on Virmire. It would have been so much easier to die on that planet. A burst of heat, and then nothing. Instead, he had to live with the guilt, a fate far worse than the instant death he would have faced had Shepard gone back for Williams.

Therapy hadn't helped at all. Shepard had just defeated the greatest threat the galaxy had seen in fifty thousand years; the act of bashing her on a shrink's couch brought with it looks of scorn and derisive comments, despite the psychiatrist's best efforts to be impartial. In one instance, the man had even called him ungrateful for "what she had done for him."

Three sessions of that and Kaidan was ready to self-medicate. He had hit the bottle fast and he hit it hard, and by the fourth month after Saren was killed, he was very much the man that now lay in his bed with a hangover: cynical, bitter, sarcastic, and almost entirely removed from the man he had once been.

Then fate chose to have the day he finally resigned from his new political post be the very same day that it chose to have Rebecca Shepard return from her assignment a week early. He had quit in the afternoon and proceeded to drink himself into a stupor.

Shepard had walked in to find Kaidan sprawled on the sofa with a bottle of scotch in his hand and several empty bottles scattered about the floor nearby. His nose was broken and his eye was swollen shut, courtesy of a pair of Turian brothers he'd met in Chora's Den a few hours earlier.

_"What the hell is all this, Kaidan?" she asked, smile flying from her face with all the speed of Jeff "Joker" Moreau's flight from a certain nuclear device's blast radius. _

_"What does it look like?" he slurred as he pressed the bottle to his lips. His inebriation was such that most of it ended up on his shirt. "I'm throwing myself a retirement party, Commander." He hadn't called her Commander since before they had consummated their relationship over Ilos. _

_The confusion read clearly on her face and he laughed harshly. "How was the assignment, Commander Shepard? Fuck up any more lives? Turn anyone else into a murderer?"_

_She was taken aback. Shepard walked to his spot on the couch as if to sit down, but Kaidan was sprawled across it and wasn't about to move. She sat down on the armchair near the couch and looked at him earnestly. "What are you talking about, Kaidan?"_

_"Christ, she's forgotten. That was quick. I think you know," he replied venomously. "Ashley Williams? Ring any bells? Or did you leave the memory behind too?"_

_"This is about the Chief?"_

_"Yeah, it's about the Chief. I killed her, Commander, and you made me do it, as sure as if you'd guided my hand and forced me to pull the trigger."_

_Moisture was welling up in Shepard's eyes. That was a first. "I...please, stop calling me Commander."_

_"Listen, Shepard. You fucked my life up. My life is in the fucking sewer, and I have you to thank for it. Think about that. Think about what you did to me the next time you let your goddamned feelings determine who you sacrifice. Now get the fuck out of my apartment."_

_"But-" Shepard began as Alenko cut her off._

_"I said get the fuck out!"_

_She sniffled loudly, tears flowing freely down her face as she rose from the easy chair. Without a word, Rebecca Shepard walked out of his apartment and out of his life. _

Kaidan was torn from his musing by the sound of tinkling glass in the living room. What the hell? It hit him. He'd thrown his empty bottle of scotch at the flat's entrance earlier, and it had shattered. Someone had just stepped in the shards. An intruder.

He silently lifted himself from the bed, ignoring his pounding headache and creeping over to the door of the bedroom. He slowly reached for the knob, gripping and turning it as silently and carefully as he could. This particular door opened into the bedroom. He cracked it as minimally as he could and peered out with his right eye.

Shit. Three intruders. With guns drawn. Did he even remember the gestures he used to use for his biotics? Would his biotics even work anymore? He had been off biotic rations for a long time, had begun eating a normal amount of food when combat was no longer part of his job description. It was better to not risk it, he decided. Instead, he eased the door back onto the latch and grabbed an empty bottle from the floor, pressing himself to the left of the door, so that when it opened he would be behind it.

It was a good sized apartment, so hopefully they'd split up. If he could kill a loner and get his firearm, there was at least a chance that he'd be able to extricate himself from the situation. Miserable as Kaidan Alenko was, he wasn't ready to let these assholes break into his apartment and kill him in the middle of the night. He hadn't fought a cybernetically enhanced mass murderer to fall victim to home invasion.

Seconds passed, though to the former Lieutenant they seemed like years. His head felt as if a rhinoceros was rampaging about inside it. There was a time when he had been used to dealing with headaches during battle, but that had been a long time ago. Presently, he wasn't used to combat even _without_ debilitating hangovers.

Shit, shit, shit. This was bad, he realized as an icy feeling came over him. He was very likely to be dead in the next five minutes. Three men with guns versus an alcoholic with a hangover and an empty bottle of Jack Daniels? It wasn't a proposition Alenko was particularly partial to.

While he was on the topic of the three men with guns, who the hell _were_ they? He couldn't fathom why three men with drawn firearms would break into his apartment at four in the morning, but none of the possibilities he could think of were appealing. Possibility number one was that they were burglars. Possibility number two was that they were hitmen. The crew of the Normandy had pissed a lot of people off back in the day, and it was entirely reasonable that someone had put out a contract on him. Possibility number three was that both one and two were both wrong and he had no idea why they were here.

The door knob spun slowly. Alenko tensed, heart pounding in his chest. So this was it. This was how he was going out. The door inched open and a human walked in, pistol in his left hand, pointed up at the ceiling. Kaidan was temporarily unseen from his spot behind the door, so he took the brief millisecond of time he had available to him to size the man up. He wore light armor and was possessed of a moderate build and red hair. That was as much hesitation as was prudent. Kaidan struck.

He launched himself at the man from the behind, right arm swinging back with the bottle to bring it crashing down on the guy's skull. The man was quicker, hearing Kaidan's movement and jerking forward and out of the way.

"In here!" The man shouted as he spun about to face Kaidan, overextended and off his balance after the massive swing had gone wide.

Red tried to raise his pistol to bear on Alenko, but the former marine was able to recover his balance, drop the bottle, and get his right hand on the man's shooting arm. He pushed the arm up and the gun discharged into the ceiling with a loud _crack!_

Alenko threw a punch with his free left hand as the two grappled for the firearm. Red jerked his head out of the way of the punch and drove his armored fist into Kaidan's unarmored stomach. Alenko grimaced and decided that his ribs must surely be broken, but he knew that to release his grip on the man's arm was to die. He also knew that if he remained as he was, back to the open door with two more men behind him, he would also die. He shifted his weight back, pulling hard on the man's arm and getting out of the way as the man was dragged towards him.

He wasted no time grabbing the staggering man and forcing his crimson-capped head down onto his knee. Kaidan winced at the sharp pain he hadn't expected this to cause, but the man grunted as his nose fractured. The former Lt. drove his left elbow down onto the back of the man's head. Red folded, unconscious. Holy shit. He'd done it. He'd gained a foothold.

"To hell with riot slugs!" someone shouted from the other room. The voice wasn't human. A Turian? Kaidan hadn't been able to get a good look from the doorway. Alenko decided that whoever was talking was about to open fire with a weapon that presumably would not be shooting riot slugs. Prudence dictated he remove himself from the doorway.

He did this just in time, grabbing the pistol from the unconscious mercenary and diving out of the way as an assault rifle opened up and mass accelerated slugs tore into the wall across from the doorway.

"What the hell are you doing?!" another voice shouted from the living room. "We need him alive, jackass!" Kaidan decided that this voice belonged to another human as he pressed himself against the side wall, as far from the door as he could be.

They needed him alive? He frowned, confused, when a sudden revelation donned on him. If they needed him alive, this pistol was loaded with non-lethal rounds. These jokers were wearing armor, so riot slugs would do approximately two things to them. Jack and Shit. He'd have to score headshots if he were to survive this encounter.

"The boss didn't say anything about him being maimed," the Turian growled as he fired another burst into the bedroom, this one aimed at the wall next to the door. Slugs tore through the thin wall, whipping by only a few feet in front of him. He grimaced as he felt the rush of air as a slug whipped by barely a foot away from him. An unsettling trend seemed to be popping up here. The gunshots were getting closer. Mercifully the burst ended and the apartment sat in uncomfortable silence.

"Drop the gun. I'm not losing this payday on account of a sociopathic Turian. I said fucking _drop it!"_

The assault rifle sounded off again, but this time the rounds didn't invade Kaidan's bedroom. The sound of shattering glass registered clearly as the human, whoever he'd been, fell to the floor and presumably landed on some empty bottles.

The icy fear Kaidan had felt before Red had entered the bedroom returned. This Turian meant business, had just killed one of his allies to complete said business. Though it wasn't at all the time, Alenko couldn't help but muse that he knew a thing or two about killing his allies. Damn it, Williams.

"Come out here," the Turian menaced from the other room. "I'm not going to kill you."

"I bet your buddy thought that too. Fuck you," Kaidan called in a calm tone that surprised even him. "Why don't you come in here instead?"

"Because you're carrying Keller's gun and I'm not a fool. Slide it out here and I'll go in." The voice was cruel, sadistic. It actually sounded like the Turian was enjoying this.

"I was born at night, pal, but not last night. C-Sec's going to be crawling up your ass soon. I'd make your decision quickly."

There was a groan from the floor, and Red -Keller- stirred. He lifted himself to all fours from the sprawled position he had been unconscious in. "Shit. He knocked me-"

There was another burst of rifle fire and Keller lurched to the side as the slugs ripped into him, accelerated by their own personal mass effect fields. Red groaned one last time and slumped back down, blood oozing from the holes in his armor and pooling on the floor.

"I've found that being the sole survivor pays better, human," the Turian remarked with a self-satisfied chuckle.

"You're a cold son of a bitch, whoever you are." Alenko's tough talk didn't sound quite as convincing anymore. This probably derived from the fact that he was scared shitless. Who was this Turian?

* * *

What was going on in that apartment? Urdnot Wrex leaned casually against the wall by the door of the flat, arms folded across his chest and an expression of mild interest on his scarred, craggy face. Whatever was happening, it sounded like his "comrades" had screwed the pooch. It sounded like a fairly heated gun battle was taking place inside, but Wrex's role was to guard the door, and that was what he planned to do until something better came along.

His money was on the Turian fucking things up. The conversation at the bar had been filled with off color remarks about how Vargan would much prefer to kill the target. If anyone was responsible for the automatic weapons fire Wrex could hear, it was him.

None of it meant anything to the big Krogan. If the morons got themselves killed, it would simply mean a greater profit margin for him. It took a hell of a lot to faze Urdnot Wrex, and whatever resistance the man in the apartment was putting up certainly wasn't enough.

He figured he'd wait another minute to go in and see what was going on.

* * *

Kaidan could hear the Turian slowly advancing on the bedroom door. It sounded as if the killer was wearing heavy combat armor, as it made a lot of noise when he walked.

His position up against the wall didn't provide a lot of cover, and the Turian presumably had the rifle leveled at the door as he moved up. Alenko looked down at the useless pistol in his right hand disdainfully, and tried to predict how tall the alien would be. There wouldn't be a lot of time to line up the necessary headshot. There was another option, however…

Alenko glanced around the room, eyes darting about frenziedly as he looked for what he was sure he had left here. Yes! An empty coffee mug lay on the floor by the bed, and next to it a trio unopened sugar packets. Remnants the hangover he had woken up with the day before. Raw eggs in the blender really had nothing on a good cup of coffee.

Alenko edged towards the packets, gun trained on the door. He took a knee and felt around for the packets with his left hand, all the while never breaking his gaze on the door. His fingers closed around one of them, which he proceeded to tear open and down like a shot of liquor. He repeated the process with the other two packets, the Turian's heavy footsteps drawing ever nearer.

He quickly glanced at the bedside table and was pleased to see that his neglected biotic amplifier hadn't been moved. Kaidan grabbed the small amp hurriedly, plugging it into the little implant jack just below the back of his neck. He winced as it made connection. Typically it was a good idea to sterilize the amp to avoid infection, but he'd rather be treated for bacteria than a hole in his head.

_This is it, Alenko_, he thought to himself grimly. If he fucked this up there would be no time to try anything else, but he had more faith in this approach than the other option. There was no way he'd get off a precise headshot faster than the Turian would be able to rip him to shreds with the assault rifle.

He focused his mind, trying to push aside the waves of nausea and head pain that the hangover filled him with. The Turian's heavy footsteps sped up as he made his move. The alien exploded into the room, rifle at the ready. His sights turned to Kaidan almost immediately, but the former marine was faster. Kaidan raised his left arm in a pushing gesture, all the while accessing parts of his brain that had been untouched for over a year.

A blue glow appeared from his hand and the space between him and the Turian seemed to shimmer, to distort. The Turian's beady eyes widened as he himself was bathed in the same blue glow.

"_Fucker!_" the Turian shouted as he was launched across the room, assault rifle flying from his hand as he slammed into the wall. The murderer dropped to the floor, limp.

Kaidan grinned ear to ear. He had done it! He'd tapped into his biotics! Alenko cracked his knuckles and began to laugh. He hadn't felt this good in a long time.

Alenko's elation was interrupted by the sound of his front door opening. He looked towards the sound, realizing his mistake even as he made it. It was too late. A gunshot rang out and the Turian clambered to his feet, pistol leveled at Kaidan.

Kaidan stumbled, looking down at himself. Shit. The slug had made contact with the right side of his chest, just below the junction of the collarbone and the shoulder. Blood pumped out of the wound. Alenko squinted as the world seemed to blur.

"Fuck," he managed weakly, before falling flat on his back.


	3. Rescues and Propositions

* * *

Author's note: Thanks for the comments on chapter 2. Now that I've graduated updates will probably be more frequent; it got pretty hectic towards the end. This one took a while to churn out because I'm still in the process of working out the plot. I know where I want to go with the characters but it took a while to come up with a conflict to frame the character growth around. Also, to adress the issue about Kaidan acting out of character, I'm gonna go with the post-traumatic stress disorder on that. It's not a fun disorder, typically causing persistant symptoms of anger and ignificant impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, at least if Wikipedia is to be trusted. I'm not going to deny that Kaidan would have sooner paired off with Navigator Pressly than behave like this in the game; it is indeed out of character in a way, but the things Kaidan goes through in the game could definitely instigate the change in his personality seen here. I've plotted out the Kaidan character growth for the arc, so perhaps these concerns will have been adressed by the time this is done anyway. Comments are still appreciated, and with that I'll shut my gob. Enjoy Chapter 3!

* * *

Chapter 3: Rescues and Propositions

"_Just when I thought I was out... they pull me back in." -Michael Corleone_

Urdnot Wrex scowled his annoyance. What was taking so long? They'd been in the apartment for nearly ten minutes. The gun battle seemed to be over; it had been a while since the last burst of automatic fire. So where were they? The wards were a crowded place and C-Sec was never too far away. A full-blown shootout in an apartment was sure to attract the attention of the law; it was just a question of when.

The Krogan wanted very much to be anywhere other than the doorway of a crime scene, but he didn't want to leave and risk his payday either. Moss, Vargan, and Keller had clearly fucked something up somewhere along the way. They could all be dead, for all Wrex knew. With a great sigh and with great reluctance, Urdnot Wrex reached for his shotgun and pressed the button beside the door. Keller had hacked the terminal to gain entry, so the door _whooshed_ open without pause.

A pistol shot sounded from a room at the back of the living room. The Krogan blinked his big red eyes and leveled the weapon ahead of him. He scanned the dim apartment, trying to get a handle on the present situation. Ken Moss lay on the floor atop some broken glass colored ruby with his blood, eyes frozen in an agonized gaze and chest a tattered ruin.

A prostrate form was hunched in the doorway into the room where the last shot had come from. Wrex recognized it as Keller. From the look of it, either their quarry was a killing machine or the Turian had gone rogue. Wrex thought back to Vargan's attitude in Chora's Den and decided to hope for the latter. The big Krogan moved on the bedroom, eyes steely and weapon steady. When he had heard the fight break out, Wrex had swapped the riot slugs for more potent ammunition, and he was quite prepared to use it.

"Wrex?" came Vargan's voice from the bedroom. "Is that you?" The fact that the Turian was speaking suggested that the final shot had been his and that the situation was under control, as far as the target was concerned. What the situation with Vargan himself was remained to be seen.

"It's me," the Krogan drawled. "What the hell happened?" There was a pause. The Turian was no doubt forming an excuse. Meanwhile, Wrex edged ever closer to the door, gun still raised.

"I killed Moss and Keller. More for you and me, my friend. Why share with humans?" Wrex had to contain a derisive snort. The Turian was obviously a better mercenary than he was a liar.

"The humans didn't sterilize me," Wrex remarked. "So there's that, anyway. You don't fool me for a second, Turian, but the way I see it is you just doubled my profit margin. So I'm going to play along."

"We have an agreement?" The Turian had lost his condescending edge and steely determination, possibly a side effect of narrowly avoiding a fight with a Krogan. Where there had once been confidence was now uncertainty, with a twinge of fear.

"We do. I'm coming in." Wrex entered the room, stepping over Keller's body and immediately fixing his gaze on Vargan.

"He's on the floor over there. Son of a bitch is a biotic," Vargan remarked. The Krogan turned to where he had gestured. A man lay unconscious on his back, an ugly crimson stain blossoming just below his right shoulder. Wrex's eyes narrowed. He looked familiar.

Wrex mentally gave the man a haircut and a shave, and then froze. It couldn't be.

"_Alenko?" _he rumbled incredulously. Was it really him? The skin tone was right, the features seemed dead on. His nose was crooked, but it was definitely Kaiden Alenko.

This complicated matters. The Krogan quickly wrapped his mind around the situation. His options were simple, obvious. Capture Alenko as he was being paid to do, or save the man. Credits or honor? Wrex stared at the man for a long moment, and came to his decision. Silently bidding farewell to twenty-five thousand credits, Wrex turned to face the Turian.

He caught Vargan in the act of picking up his assault rifle off the carpet. The treacherous mercenary's eyes widened as Wrex spun about. He quickly tried to raise the assault rifle and squeeze off a shot, but the Krogan's shotgun roared decisively, overloading the shields on Vargan's armor and knocking him back against the wall with its sheer concussive force.

He immediately erected a biotic barrier around himself as Vargan sprayed a burst from his rifle as he used his long legs to propel himself off the wall. The Turian left the ground and landed heavily to Wrex's left. The Krogan shifted his grip on the shotgun and struck Vargan with heavy left handed blow, using the weapon's barrel as a handle and its stock as a club. The Turian moved with the blow, softening its impact. Wrex's free right hand moved to his waist, bringing up a handgun. Vargan quickly brought up an omni-tool, shields sputtering to life in time to neutralize the pistol shot. The Turian spun, diving out of the way as Wrex dropped the handgun and came up with his shotgun again.

Vargan produced a small device and pressed a button at the top of it. A small charge detonated beneath Wrex's feet. The blast was small, for the most part absorbed by the barrier, but the force of the explosion knocked the Krogan off his feet. Damn it! Vargan had planted a remote mine when Wrex had been mulling over this battle.

The Krogan shook his head angrily, climbing to his feet to see Vargan running at full speed towards the apartments exit. Wrex cursed and began to run after his quarry when Alenko moaned. Shit. If the lieutenant died Wrex had blown twenty-five K for nothing.

"This isn't over, Turian," the Krogan muttered angrily. The front door slid open and Vargan was gone.

"Alright, Alenko," Wrex rumbled after a long moment. "Let's get you to a hospital." The Krogan produced a packet of medigel from a compartment on his armor and bent over the human, smearing the goo on the gunshot wound. The sound of a firearm being moved around froze Wrex in his tracks.

"C-Sec, I presume?" the Krogan drawled as he became aware of a cabal of armed officers in the apartment, guns trained at him.

* * *

The first thing he noticed was that it was bright. Fuck, why was it so bright? Kaidan Alenko slowly adjusted to the damnable brightness and realized that he was in a bed. The walls were sterile white and the lights were on full blast. He was in a small room with little more than a bed, a desk, and a pair of uncomfortable looking chairs. What had happened?

The last thing he remembered was being shot. He remembered searing, agonizing pain, he remembered the battle, and he remembered the Turian. The Turian had won. Was he dead? A pretty young woman walked by the open door of the small room clad in white and Alenko recognized her as a nurse. Yes, that made sense. He had somehow ended up at a hospital. This discredited the notion that he was dead; besides, Alenko doubted that the Hell he surely deserved to rot in would be made of bright lights and white wallpaper.

"Hey," he said to the nurse as she passed. "What the hell happened?" She turned to look at him with a start, alarm spreading across her face. She walked away hurriedly in the direction she had come from.

"Fantastic," he muttered. The alcoholic glanced around the room. A tugging sensation on his right arm alerted him to a piece of gauze taped to his arm, indicative that he had been was wired to an IV, probably to replenish some of the blood he had lost. Reminded of his wound, he looked down at his shirtless chest to see the area dressed in a bandage. It looked like he was alright, anyway. That wasn't to say that he wouldn't be more alright with a bottle of Jack Daniels, but at least he was alive.

The thought startled Kaidan. He had spent more than a year wishing for death, had nearly taken his own life, and now he was pleased to be alive? He was a hypocrite. He wasn't sure if he had always been one, but now it was almost a certainty.

He noticed a remote on the desk next to his bed and flicked on the vid-screen mounted on the wall. The last occupant of this bed had probably been a human, and an American to boot, since the channel displayed two teams locked in a grueling football game. It was raining hard and the Miami Dolphins were up by fourteen points. Alenko had never much cared for the sport and flipped on the news, shocked to see his own picture on the screen. An unmistakably Salarian voice seemed to be talking about the attack.

"Kaidan Alenko, former lieutenant of the Systems Alliance, notable for his tour on the SSV _Normandy_ under Commander Rebecca Shepard during the Geth War, was fatally wounded last night in his apartment on the wards."

Kaidan stared at the screen in disbelief. What the fuck?

The Salarian continued: "A trio of burglars is believed to have broken into Alenko's home at about four a.m. Alliance time with intent of theft. The former war hero fought back, killing two of the aggressors before succumbing to gunfire from the final assailant, who is sources tell us has escaped into the wards. C-Sec is conducting an investigation as the Alliance mourns. At this time we have been unable to establish communications with Commander Shepard, Alenko's former CO, to hear her take on the story, but we'll keep you posted with any further developments. We're going to take a break now with a message from our sponsors at-"

Alenko shut it off. What the hell was this? He hadn't killed anyone last night and nobody had killed him. So who was covering it up? And more importantly, _why_ was it being covered up?

"Hell of a thing, isn't it?" a gravelly voice remarked from the door. Kaidan turned his head to see an older man standing in the threshold, clad in navy dress. An admiral's insignia was clipped to his chest and he wore a severe expression on his face.

"Do I know you?" Alenko asked with a degree of hostility to his tone. He wasn't in the military any longer and respect wasn't something he owed to a mystery admiral standing in his hospital room.

"Not directly. I know you, Alenko. I know Shepard." Kaidan winced inwardly at the remark as the admiral introduced himself. "Hackett. Admiral Stephen Hackett. The nurse told me you were back among the living."

"You were Shepard's Alliance handler when I was on the _Normandy_," Kaidan remarked. So this was the enigma, the man who had given them so many assignments during the hunt for Saren. Bit of a prick, if memory served. He had thrown a lot of shit in their laps that other people should have been able to handle.

"That's right. More recently I've taken a new position. I'm involved in some special ops work. I command a smaller group now, but the work we're doing is just as important. Behind the scenes kind of protection, out of the public eye but in the public's best interest."

"I'm sure," Alenko replied venomously. "I'm sure that's how Cerberus started too. I'm sure you remember Cerberus."

"Don't confuse my work with that of Cerberus, Mr. Alenko. Cerberus was out of control. I answer directly to the president." Alenko nearly made another sarcastic retort but decided that he wasn't getting anywhere. The newest president of the Systems Alliance was none other than Donnel Udina, one of the galaxy's all-time assholes and the former human ambassador to the Citadel Council, back when humanity hadn't had a seat.

Alenko had to admit, it felt strangely liberating to mouth off to an admiral. The Kaidan of two years ago wouldn't have dreamt of it, but now he could see the admiral for what he was. Hackett had always been manipulative, had used the _Normandy_ to accomplish his own goals while asking them to put their crucial task on hold. Now he was presumably manipulating Kaidan. An admiral wasn't an impossible celebrity; he was a man, the same as any other.

"Cut the bullshit," Alenko said bluntly. "People broke into my house and shot me last night, and now the media is telling everyone that I'm dead. Seems to me like you have some explaining to do, Steve."

If Hackett was offended, he did a remarkable job of hiding it. "Hell of a thing, isn't it?" he repeated. "It's for your own safety, Mr. Alenko. The people who ordered the attack on you will probably keep coming at you until they've either succeeded or been dealt with."

"What's that to you?" Kaidan inquired, suspicious. Typically, steps like this wouldn't be taken just to protect him. It would make more sense to simply place him under guard. The faked death, complete with false media coverage, suggested something that ran deeper and involved Kaidan Alenko intimately.

"You're a suspicious man, Mr. Alenko," the admiral noted with a chuckle, stepping into the room and closing the door behind him. He sat in the chair at the foot of Kaidan's bed and cracked his knuckles.

"Put yourself in my place, Steve." Kaidan silently applauded himself for the use of Hackett's first name. He was pissed off, had every right to be, and wanted to make damn sure that Stephen Hackett knew it. "I haven't had a fun twenty-four hours, and dodging my questions isn't improving my mood."

"Fine. Quite frankly, Mr. Alenko, we faked your death because we're trying to avert a disaster." Well, that was certainly a bold statement.

"You're not making any sense, Hackett."

"What do you know about Conatix, Mr. Alenko?" The question plowed into Kaidan Alenko like a freight train.

"Far more than I'd like to," was his curt reply. Far more than he'd like indeed. It was Conatix Industries that had fitted him with the L2 implants, Conatix Industries that had extradited him to Jump Zero when he was just a kid, Conatix Industries that had hired mercenaries to teach children. It was also suspected that Conatix had intentionally exposed expectant mothers to Element Zero, fixing it so that the unborn child had potential to be absorbed in the fledgling biotic program without the consent of the parents.

Simply put, Conatix Industries had put the "corrupt" in corruption. Alenko looked at the company, which had gone belly-up after Kaidan had accidentally caused an embarrassment in the form of Commander Vyrnnus' death, with the utmost contempt.

"I figured you might. What I'm about to tell you stays in this room, Alenko, unless I say otherwise."

Kaidan nodded, now intrigued. It seemed as if the attack on him was even further from a simple home invasion than he had suspected.

"Tell me what you know about what happened to Conatix after your…outburst on Gagarin Station." Hackett knew about Vyrnnus? The files had been classified, but Kaidan supposed that if there was indeed any truth in Hackett's looming explanation, those files would have been made known to him.

"After I killed Vyrnnus? Pretty much what everyone knows. After Brain Camp-sorry, Biotic Acclimation and Temperance Training was closed down, Conatix stocks plummeted. The corporation fell through and a number of smaller companies were born in the ashes. A lot of prominent scientists worked at Conatix and a lot of people lost out when they all split up. I'm assuming you're about to shoot holes in that?"

Hackett smirked wryly. "To a point. What if I told you that Conatix's most lauded development team may have recently been reunited? We've heard rumblings, Mr. Alenko. The Shadow Broker keeps us in the know about people like that. It's simply more cost effective than placing such people under our own surveillance. Anyway, four scientists with notoriously loose morals, the people who came up with the L2 implants and tested them on kids like yourself with full knowledge of the risks, fell off the grid. We don't know who's hired them or where they've been assembled but it's too much of a coincidence to ignore. This first came to our attention six weeks ago."

"You understand, these people are brilliant scientists; leading specialists in work with Element Zero. Were it not for their darker tendencies and questionable ethics, they'd be prominent figures in the public eye. We think that someone did his homework, found out that these were the people to go to for anything to do with Element Zero that might not necessarily meet certain legal requirements. If this is the case, whatever they're working on now isn't something we can allow to come to fruition."

Kaidan frowned. "My heart breaks for you, but I don't see what this has to do with me." Alenko needed a drink. He put on a callous outward appearance but he was disturbed by what Hackett was telling him. Something big certainly did seem to be brewing, if Hackett wasn't lying to him.

"You're not the only L2 to come under attack. Our sources have identified at least a dozen L2s who have simply vanished. Off the radar, completely. You're an intelligent man. A bit…uncouth, but intelligent. Take an educated guess as to when these abductions began."

_Holy shit_. "Six weeks ago," Kaidan murmured. "It started at the same time."

"Right. At this point we have to assume that there's a connection." Kaidan got the impression that Hackett was playing straight with him.

Something occurred to him. It was on a tangent but he needed to know. "How did I end up here? The last thing I remember is getting shot by a Turian."

Hackett smiled. "It seems that fate smiles on you, Mr. Alenko. The only reason you're not in the custody of whoever it is that is behind this is an extreme coincidence. It turns out that one of the mercs hired to capture you was an old war buddy."

Kaidan stared blankly at the admiral. Who did he know that-_Wrex_. "It wasn't Wrex, was it?" he asked, shock registering clearly in his voice. He hadn't seen the Krogan since right after the war. Wrex had left the _Normandy_ to make a pilgrimage to his homeworld to return his grandfather's battle armor. He had taken with him a great sum of credits, paid in thanks for his role in bringing down Saren. If Kaidan knew Wrex at all, the Krogan had wasted little time reprising his role as a hired gun.

"It was. C-Sec was going to arrest him, but we were able to bring both him and you into our custody before things got too public. The officers have been paid to tell anyone who will listen that you were dead on the scene, with the threat that if they say a word they'll find themselves in a world of trouble. Wrex filled us in after we assured him that we'd pay double what his employer had offered."

"He and three other mercenaries were given your address and a location that they were to bring you to alive. They didn't get your name and they weren't informed of your abilities. Another thing that they weren't given was any information about who they were working for. The Turian mercenary went rogue and killed the two humans, and managed to escape after a short struggle with Wrex. Unfortunately, none of the officers saw him leave, so he could be anywhere by now."

"Shit," he groaned. "That Turian was an animal. The man he killed in my bedroom wasn't even armed. He shot him as he was regaining consciousness." Alenko sighed. "So what's being done about this?"

"We've chosen a vessel to go to the drop-off point and poke around a bit. The SSV _Alexander._ Wrex will be accompanying them. The council has of course been informed of something of this magnitude and they're sending a Spectre along as well. We'd like you to accompany them. The doctor tells me you're essentially good as new and don't need to be here any longer."

Kaidan shifted in the bed and looked incredulously at the admiral. "Why the hell would I want to do that? I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm not a politician anymore. I'm an alcoholic. I just want to go back to my whiskey, Hackett."

"I'm afraid that's not an option. Speaking of options, Alenko, you've got two. Option one is you take advantage of this facility's hospitality until this blows over. Your other choice is to go on the _Alexander_. This wouldn't be a reinstatement of your rank, Mr. Alenko. We're giving you the opportunity to go along as an observer to a mission that clearly concerns you. You won't have to leave the ship."

This wouldn't do. Either of those options parted Kaidan from his escape for at least a few weeks. The dreams would ravage him in that time if he couldn't self-medicate. That was a given, regardless of whether he chose the hospital or the ship. He mulled it over.

He _was _curious to find out what was going on, and it might be nice to get a chance to catch up with the Krogan, ugly as he was. Glancing down at his white hospital gown with disdain, Kaidan made up his mind. "Fine, Steve. This better be worth it."

"The ship leaves tomorrow at 1200 hours. Tomorrow morning you're going to take a shuttle from this facility to the docking bay. No one is to see you until you're aboard. You're doing the right thing, Kaidan."

"We'll see," Kaidan replied. "Any way you can get some clothes delivered to me from my apartment?" He wasn't going to wear his hospital regalia on a starship and he sure as hell wasn't going to wear a uniform.

"Write up a list and give it to the nurse, I'll see that they're waiting for you in your quarters aboard the _Alexander._ And Alenko," Hackett said as he rose to leave. "Clean yourself up. It's hard to take a man seriously when he looks like he's spent the past month in the wilderness."

Before Alenko had a chance to retort, the admiral moved from the room, door clicking shut behind him. The former marine lieutenant turned alcoholic shook his head at the entire affair and flicked on the vid-screen. "Wonder if the Dolphins are still winning?" he mused aloud.


	4. Drug Seeking Behavior

**Author's Note: **Thanks to my reviewers, as always! I'm going to take a page from 'Nizumee's book and adress chapter 3's reviewers individually, because it's kind of a nice way to thank and acknowledge people for reading this. By the by, it might be a bit late to mention this, expect a fair amount of OCs in here. Kaidan is obviously the focus, but since half of the crew from ME1 is either dead or estranged from Kaidan, I needed to have some other people for him to interact with.

AFlockOfBunnies: Yep, Udina's the president. I went with him because this story takes off from a "Shepard saves the council, inducts Anderson" ending. Glad you like the story!

shyanonymous: Also glad you liked it, hopefully this chapter will continue to keep you liking it!

'Nizumee: Thanks much for the glowing praise! I always thought it would be interesting to have a fic that took place after ME where Shepard and the object of his/her affections weren't happily married or something similar. Glad you like the take on it. Eagerly awaiting the next chapter of "Shepard's Big Galactic Adventure" by the way.

AConley: Thanks for the review. I tried to nail his problems pretty realistically. I even used a psychology textbook to avoid making up symptoms lol. Definitely enjoyed your Randall Flagg/Halo crossover by the way. Flagg/Marten/Walter/whatever the hell you want to call him has always been a favorite villain of mine.

Anyway, here's Chapter 4. Without further blather, I'll let you get to it!

Chapter 4: Drug-Seeking Behavior

_They just help you on your way, through your busy dying day. – The Rolling Stones_

Alenko stood with a pair of marines in the _SSV Alexander_'s airlock as the decontaminator passed over them. Kaidan closed his eyes as the light approached him. He had learned this trick long ago. There was no better way to cause an L2 flare-up than to have a blinding light pass right across your face. His first few times on ships after receiving the implants had given him horrid, but he quickly adapted to the situation. He heard the familiar _whoosh_ of the airlock door and opened his eyes.

The two marines were already moving. They were young men but they looked like they had some experience under their belts. There was no mistaking a true soldier. These marines exuded self-confidence, from the way they carried themselves to the look in their eyes. Alenko supposed he may have been like that once, but that time had passed. He glanced down at his clothing, a pair of dark blue jeans, a white t-shirt and a red Hawaiian shirt over it, unbuttoned, and chuckled at how out of place he would look on a military vessel.

Kaidan ran a hand across his newly shaven chin and stepped onto the ship. He was momentarily taken aback by its design. It quickly occurred to him that the _Normandy_'s design had been anything but typical. He had gotten used to it during his weeks serving aboard it, and had almost forgotten what the interior of a normal ship looked like.

The _Alexander_'s bridge followed the traditional design. A captain's chair was set in the center of the room with terminals for navigation, weaponry, sensors, and other critical controls scattered around. It was a more logical setup than the _Normandy_'s long hallway; it made more sense to have the bridge crew in a closer vicinity to one another. The hallway setup of the Normandy was a concession that had been made for the Turians collaborating on its design; it had never been the ideal format for a human crew.

The _Alexander_ was a cruiser-class starship, bigger and more durable than a frigate but more maneuverable than a dreadnought. This allowed it to comfortably fit more crewman than a vessel like the _Normandy_. Kaidan remembered the sleep pod he had occupied during the hunt for Saren and thanked the Lord that there were individual quarters on this ship.

The bridge was full to capacity; crewmen were stationed at various posts making sure all systems were operational and ready to go before takeoff. A man who must be the captain sat in the designated chair and stood when Alenko entered the room.

"You must be Kaidan Alenko," the captain said matter-of-factly. He was a man of average height and build, looking to be in his late forties. His hair was a shade of auburn, with grey hairs beginning to make their appearance at the temples. The captain had a severe look about him, as if he just wanted to get this the hell over with. Alenko echoed the sentiment.

"That's me," Alenko replied. "And you are…?"

"Captain Reginald Stillwater. Have you been briefed?" The captain seemed all for getting right down to business. Kaidan guessed that he might not be entirely welcome aboard this vessel and that Stillwater wanted him off to the side, and quickly.

"Not entirely. I know the gist of what's going on but I still don't know where the hell we're going."

The captain grunted with irritation. "They didn't even brief you? Pain in the ass. Fine. The rendezvous point for the mercenaries was on the planet Thessia. Before you ask me a stupid question, Thessia is indeed the asari homeworld. You were to be delivered to a small city several kilometers outside of Serrice known as Hamalah. Urdnot Wrex is going to bring you to the specified location and begin to make the handoff, at which point our fireteam is going to bring the wrath of God Himself down on the sorry bastards that show up. We're going to take-"

Kaidan cut him off. "Hang on. No. Nobody told me about any handoffs. Hackett told me I was along as an observer and that I never needed to step foot outside this ship."

"Well, Mr. Alenko, it seems that somebody lied to you. I can assure your safety, if that's your concern, but one way or another, your involvement is critical to the success of this mission."

"Bullshit. I'm leaving," Alenko replied, turning on his heel and moving towards the door. The two marines were standing in front of the exit door, staring at him resolutely, as if daring him to make a move. Alenko silently cursed himself for not staying at the hospital, though it now looked as if his voluntary attendance of this mission had simply been a lie fabricated to make things run more smoothly. He swore.

A new voice sounded out. "Is there a problem, Captain? I'd like to get underway soon." The voice was vaguely metallic in tone, and also familiar. Alenko spun back around to face the captain. There, standing in the open doorway of the bridge, was the Garrus Vakarian, the Turian who had served aboard the _Normandy_ during the conflict.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Kaidan asked in disbelief.

"Ah. Kaidan. Good to see you. It seems like half of the old crew is on the op. All we need now is Shepard and it'd be a party," the Turian said with a chuckle. "You two still together?" Kaidan winced inwardly but held his peace. How could Garrus be expected to know?

"Uh, no. We had a falling out," Kaidan replied, not wishing to share his life's story with the unknown bridge crew. If he talked with Garrus more privately later, perhaps he'd be more open. Either way, it mattered little. "Want to explain why I'm being held on this ship against my will?"

"It wasn't my idea to keep you in the dark, but we _do_ need you present to make contact with the targets. This is an important mission, Kaidan. The council doesn't want any foul-ups. It was my idea to use you as the bait. The plan is to take a captive and interrogate him."

Kaidan blinked. Of course. Garrus had become a Spectre. That explained his presence here.

Stillwater snorted derisively, shit-eating grin wide on his face. "That was what _I_ said. He wouldn't take _my_ word for it," the captain remarked haughtily.

"Blow me," Kaidan said simply as he walked towards Garrus and the door. "Where are my quarters? I'll show myself there."

"I could have you put in the brig," the captain replied angrily. "This is my ship and I won't be spoken to like that!"

"Go for it," the former lieutenant replied, turning around to face Stillwater yet again. "I didn't ask for this, Stillwater. If you want to detain me, that's your prerogative. I'm in no position to stop you. Now, we can get into a dick-waving contest on the bridge of your ship and fight it out for manly superiority, or you can tell me where my quarters are and back the fuck off."

All bridge activities ceased as the two men stared at each other, neither breaking eye contact, neither moving a muscle. "Deck Two, room twelve," the captain said through gritted teeth. "Get off my bridge."

"You don't have to tell me twice," Kaidan muttered under his breath as he slid past Vakarian and through the threshold.

* * *

Things were certainly looking down, Kaidan decided as he sat at the steel desk bolted to the wall of the ten-by-eight pillbox known as his quarters. He couldn't shake the persistent feeling that he had been had. He could picture Steve Hackett's face, could practically see the bullshit pouring out of his mouth. Hackett's new position seemed to carry with it a "do whatever the hell I want and get away with it" badge, as such involuntary participation was entirely legal if Kaidan had paid any attention at all in civics class, back in the day.

And then there was the good Captain Stillwater. Stillwater bore an obvious dislike for him and had wasted no time trying to push him around. His bark was clearly worse than his bite; he had folded the instant Kaidan had applied the slightest verbal pressure.

The ship was underway, approaching the first relay. Due to their present location and the location of Thessia, it would take roughly five days to reach the Asari homeworld, since there were no relays nearby that could provide a direct jump there. Instead they were taking a route that involved jumping through no less than five mass effect relays, with substantial travel time in between jumps. It was to be a long couple of days.

Geddy Lee's shrieking voice belted out the dystopian lyrics to "Red Barchetta," a century-old Rush tune that Alenko was partial to, from the computer terminal on the desk. His dad had been a big Rush fan back in the day, taking pride in the fact that, like the Alenko family, Rush was Canadian. His father was a few years in the grave, a victim of terminal kidney cancer. Something else to be depressed about, and something else to drink over.

He needed some liquor. He had been in his quarters for about twelve hours, and the nap he had attempted to take had ended with a choked scream and a tumble out of the spartan military bunk. Ashley Williams continued to taunt him in his dreams, throwing the weight of her death upon his shoulders. He glanced at the sheets, bunched up and drenched in sweat, and tried to no avail focus on Alex Lifeson's shredding guitar solo. At least, he thought to himself dryly, the implants hadn't flared up and given him a migraine to boot.

His door _whooshed_ open, startling him momentarily. A massive Krogan stood silhouetted by the light in the outside hall. It took him a second to process the occurrence but he relaxed as his mind puzzled it out. "Alenko," Wrex said in greeting, stepping into the room without waiting for confirmation. "What the hell are you listening to?"

Alenko sighed and muted the song. "Not a damn thing. Sit down if you want."

Wrex shook his head, instead leaning casually against the wall. "So what's the story, Alenko? I figured you for a lifer."

Kaidan had indeed figured himself for a lifer. The answer he had given himself was the same answer he gave to the enormous mercenary. "Shit happens," he said.

"What kind of shit?" the Krogan asked in a disinterested tone. "Not that it matters much to me, but I got nothing else to do."

This put Kaidan in a bind. Wrex, as was the norm for his people, frowned heavily on weakness. However, the Krogan was essentially the only person he had encountered in the last two days who hadn't screwed him over in any way. Alienating him with a sob story about post traumatic stress, survivor's guilt, and alcoholism hardly seemed like the best way to assure Wrex's further cooperation.

However, if he lied and Wrex saw through it, things wouldn't turn out any better. Kaidan didn't really want a cold-blooded (literally and metaphorically) killer giving him advice on his problems anyway, so he decided to limit his explanation to the thing that was easiest to explain, his substance abuse.

"I hit the drink. Hard," he said, quickly, trying to keep this part of the conversation brief.

The Krogan grunted in reply. "Booze," he said in his gravelly voice. "Always seems like a good idea at the time." The Krogan seemed to shrug, if such a thing was anatomically possible. "It's your life," he remarked, setting the issue aside.

"Did they force you to come along, Wrex?" Kaidan had never really understood the Krogan, wasn't sure if his motivation stemmed from a simple enjoyment of his work or if he actually believed in anything, as Kaidan once had. It was possible that Wrex was here against his will, and that could forge a potential alliance between the two, a means of resisting the military bureaucracy that had so wantonly jerked their lives around.

"They offered to pay me and I accepted. Bastards probably would have tried to take me even if I'd refused, so I figured there was no reason to turn down a fat check." Wrex paused for a second, and then spoke. "Using you as bait wasn't my idea. That was all Vakarian, Alenko. Can't expect much more from a Turian anyway. Look at what the Krogan got after an alliance with them."

Kaidan didn't hold Garrus as particularly contemptible, but the Turian definitely wasn't free of his ire. He believed that Garrus hadn't wanted him kept in the dark, though; the former C-Sec officer had always played straight with him before.

"Thanks, Wrex. For that and hauling my ass out of there back on the Citadel."

Wrex pushed off from the wall, apparently uncomfortable with receiving thanks. "I need to head out, Alenko. Just wanted to level with you." The Krogan walked out the door, leaving Alenko alone again.

He had hoped for a longer conversation. Fucking _anything_ was better than sitting here sober and miserable. He silently cursed Rebecca Shepard for what was probably the millionth time. There had to be something on this ship to take the edge off and allow him to get some sleep that didn't lead to the same goddamn nightmare.

It was always the same. Ashley would be there, pretty as ever, and condemn him as the murderer he was. Then she would rapidly sustain all the injuries she must have recieved on Virmire, beginning with gunshots and leading to utter nuclear annihilation.

He almost wished Wrex had let the mercenary kill him. In the heat of the moment, survival had seemed like the only option, but he hadn't known at the time that he'd be forced into a black ops assignment and stripped of the one thing that brought him any comfort.

He turned the music back up and was mildly annoyed to hear that Rush had finished and given way to some insipid shit whose name escaped him. There were only a handful of extranet stations where you could get tunes from that long ago, so bad music was a common occurrence. He switched the station to something more current, but decided that he didn't feel like sitting here any longer. He shut it off and rose from his chair, inspiration striking.

* * *

It took a few minutes for Alenko to find the sickbay. It was here that he expected to find a ship's doctor who would no doubt be as big an asshole as everyone else aboard this ship, if his run of luck was to continue.

The plan was to go to the chief medical officer and obtain tranquilizers by any means necessary. Pills weren't as good as booze, but Thessia was a couple days off and he sure as hell didn't want to be mindfucked by the dream every time he closed his eyes between now and then.

The door slid open and he stepped into the med-bay. A stocky man with short blonde hair hunched over a computer terminal next to one of the beds, furiously typing what was probably a report of some kind. Alenko cleared his throat to get the man's attention.

"You the doc?" he asked pointedly.

The man turned from his console and looked at Kaidan appraisingly. "You're Alenko? I can't believe it!" Seeing the man's face, it was clear that he was little more than a kid. About the same age Jenkins had been, with the same youthful exuberance. _Poor Jenkins_, Alenko thought to himself with regret.

"Right. So you're the doctor?"

The man rose and stuck out a hand. Kaidan reluctantly offered his own and was snatched into a death grip, the man furiously shaking his hand in what Kaidan supposed was technically a friendly manner. "It's an honor. Jake Hanley. I'm just a tech. The CMO is down at the mess on a break."

An honor, huh? Kaidan raised an eyebrow as the man continued to shake his hand. Frowning, he pulled it away. "Uh, it's nice to meet you. Not sure why you're honored, but it beats the greeting I got from El Capitan."

"You're a hero, Kai-can I call you Kaidan?" He had expected an asshole doctor, but had found a fan. Unexpected, but potentially advantageous.

"Go for it," Kaidan replied. This brought a delighted smile to the man's face.

"Thanks Kaidan! Anyway, I've wanted to meet you ever since the war. I've always loved an unsung hero, and in that case it's you, my friend. Commander Shepard's loyal confidant, always there to lend an ear and help her in-"

"Listen," Kaidan said, ending the tangent before it managed to piss him off any further. As tempted as he was to perform an act of violence on the hapless technician, he sensed an opportunity to ease his pain and get some fucking sleep. "I need your help Jake."

This got Hanley's attention. "A favor? For Kaidan Alenko? You name it."

"Pills, Jake. Tranquilizers."

Hanley was at a loss. His youthful face read a combination of confusion and suspicion. "Why do you need tranquilizers, Kaidan?"

He considered his words carefully before giving the kid an explanation that contained a good deal of truth, injected with a sizable amount of melodrama. "War is ugly, Jake. It fucks you up. It fucks you up until you don't know who you are anymore. I need those pills to sleep, Jake, and I'm praying to God that you'll give them to me."

Jake frowned. "I'm so sorry to hear that, Kaidan, but I'm really not in a position to give you anything. It's not that I don't want to, but the CMO would have my head if I started handing out medications without explicit instructions."

The kid's adoration only went so far, it seemed. "Are you sure? Just enough to let me get some sleep before Thessia?"

"I'm really sorry, but I need to keep my job. If I lose this position its back to the colonies for me," Hanley replied, visibly apologetic but unwavering in his answer.

The former marine ran a hand through his hair and cracked his neck. "Alright," he mused after a moment. "I'll head down to the mess hall and speak with the CMO."

Jake sighed, relieved that Kaidan had let the issue go. "Thanks, Kaidan. I'm sure the doctor will understand; it's just not within my authority to provide you with meds."

The youth stuck out his hand again. Kaidan shook it reluctantly and walked from the sickbay, silently cursing the young officer as he made his way to the mess hall.

* * *

He arrived in the mess hall to see a fair amount of crewmen milling about, socializing and eating. _Well shit,_ he thought to himself. _Who am I looking for?_

He grabbed a meal from the cook, a short man at a takeaway counter who was furiously whipping up more, and took it to an empty table. The meat was decent, though he wasn't entirely sure what kind of animal it had come from. The pasta was also tolerable, though the sauce lacked kick. He forked through the meal absentmindedly as he scanned the room for signs of the physician.

Finally, he saw a woman sitting with a small group of crewmen who wore the insignia of a fleet doctor on her shoulder. She certainly wasn't what he had been looking for. It had been nice of Hanley to mention that the doctor was gorgeous. Her hair was a strawberry blonde, falling just below her shoulders. Her green eyes sparkled as she laughed at what was no doubt a horrible joke from one of the people in her group. He put his fork down on the plate and rose to his feet, striding over to the woman.

"Are you the CMO here?" he asked, a bit more bluntly than he had intended. _More flies with honey, Alenko_, he thought chidingly.

"I am. Do you need something?" she replied, seeming a bit put off by his demeanor.

"Yeah," he replied, trying to soften the cynicism in his voice a bit. "Sorry, to interrupt, but I was wondering if I could talk to you for a moment. Privately, if it's possible."

"Sure," she said, seeming to brighten a bit at his new tone. She rose and followed him to the table where he had been eating.

"You're Kaidan Alenko," she remarked. Damn, she was beautiful. He wasn't even wearing his beer goggles, the magical key to making anybody look like a model. "What can I do for you?"

"I talked to your technician. He referred me to you. I wasn't able to get my meds from my apartment before this mission started, and I need them to sleep. Is there anything you can give me? Tranquilizers?"

She looked at him appraisingly. "What do you take them for?"

"I'm not a stable man," he replied honestly. "I've got a lot on my mental plate. One of my missions during the war…" he paused, looking for the words. "It ruined me. I haven't had a good night of sleep without tranquilizers since." He was surprised at how painfully truthful he was being, and chalked it up to how desperately he needed her compliance.

"Have you been to counseling?" she asked clinically.

"Briefly. It wasn't helping, so I stopped going." The less said about therapy, the better. Alenko had nearly put that psychiatrist prick through a window.

She gave him a look, a raised eyebrow. "Why are your hands shaking, Mr. Alenko?" Shit. The jig was up. Observant woman. He had noticed it himself a few hours ago. This was the longest he had gone sober in more than a year, and the D.T. tremors had already begun.

"Fuck," he muttered, throwing a hand to his mouth even as the sound was escaping it. He had let that one slip.

"Do you have something you'd like to tell me, Mr. Alenko?"

"Call me Kaidan. And yeah, you got me. I'm known to have a few drinks now and again. And again. And again."

"Well, _Kaidan_, in light of this, I don't think I can provide you with any medication. I can, however, clear some time on my schedule for a few counseling sessions." She did seem to care about his plight, which was refreshing in itself, but he didn't want counseling. He wanted pills, lots of them.

"I don't need any counseling. I'll tough it out in my quarters if it comes to it, but I'm not getting any therapy," Kaidan replied, the cold edge returning to his voice.

"What do you have against therapy, Kaidan?"

"Plenty," he replied angrily. "How about when my shrink told me that the person who ruined my life actually deserved my thanks? How about when the same cocksucker told me that I was a liar? Or when I got into a fistfight with him? That was fun."

"I'm not that man, Kaidan. You obviously need a helping hand, Kaidan. Sometimes even just talking about it can help. I have a degree in psychology and I'm a good listener."

"There's no way I can convince you to give me some pills?" He didn't know precisely when he had become such a prick, but his stubborn refusal of willing aid from a woman who obviously wanted to help was a good reminder of the fact that he was one. He hated his substance abuse, but his need was such that he ignored his logical side and tried to stroke the habit even further.

"No way at all. Are you sure you don't want my help?"

The little voice in Kaidan's mind, the voice of cynicism and stubbornness, told him to tell her that yes, he was absolutely sure and she should mind her own business. For once, Kaidan Alenko told the little voice to shut the fuck up. "Alright," he replied. "You seem like a good person. I'm willing to give therapy another shot. I don't know what you can hope to accomplish in four days, but I don't see any alternatives at the moment."

She smiled prettily, perfect teeth flashing. "That's great, Kaidan," she said sincerely. "I know it's a big step for you to take. You don't even know me."

"I never got your name," he remarked with a small smirk.

"Kate Winters," she replied. "Nice to meet you, Kaidan," she said with a smile, reaching out to shake his hand across the table. "I need to finish up my meal and get some reports done, but if you'd like to head on down to sickbay in an hour we'll have a session."

"Alright then," he replied, grabbing his plate and rising. "I'll see you then." He hadn't gotten his pills, but things were admittedly looking better than they had been, he decided as he put the plate down on the return counter and left the mess hall. He walked in the direction of his quarters, hoping that Rush would be there to greet him on the extranet.

* * *

He had moved the bodies into the cargo hold and jettisoned them after the ship had gotten through the first relay and cleared from the range of the Citadel. Landing on Thessia would be no problem at all, and the loose ends had to be tied up. The crew had begged, pleaded for their lives. He hadn't spared any of the wretches.

He sat at the controls of the ship, assault rifle lying in the copilot's seat and pistol lying atop the console. C-Sec had run right by his hiding place in the dark alley by the target's house, and he had wasted no time getting off the Citadel. The Krogan was doubtlessly leading an Alliance team to the rendezvous, and the Turian mercenary Vargan planned to beat them there. He would kill them, saving the meddlesome Krogan for last. He would kill them all.


	5. Hitting the Fan

**Author's note: **You may or may not have noticed, but this chapter came out a lot faster than previous ones. This should be the case for a while, and one or two more chapters may come out in as early as a week or two. My Xbox decided to red ring on me, stripping me of my other main distraction, so I've been writing a lot more. I fully intend to finish this, since at least a few people seem to really like it. There's nothing I hate more than becoming invested in a story that never gets wrapped up. Oh HBO, why did you cancel _Deadwood_? Anyway, thanks to my reviewers yet again!

Sinvraal: Thanks for reading! I eagerly await more _Iunctio_, by the way.

Zing-baby: Thanks for all that praise! I really appreciate it. Keeping the tone constant is definitely a big concern for me. Massive tonal shifts can definitely harm a work of fiction. Looking forward to that Jade Empire fic, by the way. Hell of a game.

AFlockOfBunnies: Thanks much for your constant readership! Who knows, maybe Shepard will make an appearance later on?

And without further prattle, here's chapter five of Mass Effect: Redemption!

Chapter Five: Hitting the Fan

_Killing is my business…and business is good! – Megadeth_

"It all goes back to Virmire, doesn't it?" Kate Winters remarked as Alenko sat on one of the medical beds in the sickbay talking about life after that fateful explosion. There were no designated locations to have therapy sessions aboard an Alliance cruiser, so they had had to make do with current arrangements. Kate sat in a swivel chair a few feet away.

"I can never forgive her," Kaidan replied. Winters was surprisingly easy to talk to. He didn't feel any better about Virmire or Ashley, but the level to which he had opened up about his problems shocked him. "Shepard's at the heart of it all. Can't forgive myself, either. I never should have allowed things to progress as far as they did with Shepard. She should have saved Ashley."

His hands shook with stubborn consistency and he felt like he was going to puke. Winters had refused to give him anything and assured him that the withdrawal symptoms were temporary. It didn't make his stomach feel any better. It also didn't help that he had had a searing migraine for two of the five days he had been on the ship. Thankfully, the destructive gremlins in his head were currently on break, so things weren't too bad on that front now.

They were due to arrive at Thessia within the hour and the ground team would disembark immediately. Alenko was eager to get off this tub, but at the same time looked at the coming mission with growing trepidation. He was admittedly pretty scared, so he had requisitioned himself a new biotic amp from the quartermaster of the _Alexander_ and had been eating like a horse, taking in the nutrients required to facilitate his biotics in a pinch. When he went out it would be on his own terms, not as a bait on a black ops assignment he'd been brought on involuntarily.

"Look at me," he said angrily. "I'm pathetic. She did that to me. That fucking Spectre."

Kate gazed at him. "Put yourself in her place for a moment. Choose between your friend and your lover. Save one of them. The other dies. That's a lot of responsibility, isn't it?"

"Ashley had a family! I've got nobody! It was fucking selfish!" Any defense of Shepard set his blood to a boil; it had been this way for a year and a half. He hated the Spectre. This wasn't likely to change.

"Imagine the man you were two years ago had to choose between Ashley Williams and Rebecca Shepard," Kate offered mildly, ignoring his outburst.

He mulled it over. It _would _have been tough to choose. He wanted to tell himself that he would have saved Ashley, but he found that he couldn't. That old, forgotten Kaidan Alenko was in love with Rebecca Shepard, would have trudged through hell to save her.

He opened his mouth to speak when the ship's intercom crackled to life. "This is Captain Stillwater speaking. We're presently coming in for port on Thessia. I want the ground crew geared up and ready to go in five minutes. Kaidan Alenko is to report to the bridge immediately."

"Shit," he said aloud. "Well, doc, it looks like I'm off."

"Good luck," she said seriously. "Take care of yourself out there."

He paused for a moment, looking for the words. He felt that he owed her thanks, at the very least. She had been kind to him, had provided him with a conduit to release some of his frustration. Nothing had really changed; he was still an alcoholic and would resume swilling liquor as soon as the opportunity presented itself. He still wished he had died on Virmire. He still loathed Rebecca. But talking about it seemed to have lifted some weight off of his shoulders, and he was grateful.

"Listen, Kate. I want to thank you. I don't know if I'm going to survive this handoff, but I don't want to get killed without thanking you for listening to me, helping me organize all this baggage a little bit. So…uh, thanks," he finished awkwardly, rising and sticking out a hand. She stood and gripped his hand, shaking it firmly.

"Any time, Kaidan. You're a good person, you know. You may not think it. But you are." She had a way of saying the right things, making him feel a little bit better. Shepard had been able to do that, back before she'd stuck a metaphorical dagger through his heart.

"Thanks," he replied. "I don't know how much truth there is in that, but it's nice to hear. See you around." He pulled his hand away and left the doctor in her sickbay.

He was thoughtful as he walked to the bridge. He would not have saved Ashley two years ago. This realization did not have the liberating effect that Kate obviously hoped that it would. While it did give him an insight into Shepard's motivation, the repercussions of that decision were still too severe and far reaching for him to look towards the commander with anything but resentment.

It also served to make him feel even guiltier. The realization that he would have chosen to save Rebecca over Ashley made Ashley's death even more unforgivable. It was as if the poor kid never had a chance. He had spent the last year and a half dwelling on the event, wishing it had been different. Realizing that he himself would have taken the selfish way out, saved the one he was personally attached to, made him feel like shit. Not that feeling like shit was a new sensation to Kaidan Alenko.

* * *

Garrus and Stillwater were already on the bridge. The view ports showed that the ship had touched down in a small outdoor docking bay. They were on Thessia, in what Kaidan knew must be Hamalah.

"Alenko," Stillwater greeted him gruffly. "Are you ready to cooperate?"

"Do I have a choice?" Alenko asked sarcastically. "I'll cooperate, but God help you if you screw me again."

The captain ignored the comment. "Two groups will be leaving the ship simultaneously from different exits. There's a fair chance we're already being watched by the enemy, so we need to make this fairly discreet. You'll be leaving with Medusa squad. You'll also be wearing some armor to disguise your presence. The plan is to get somewhere secluded and meet up with Wrex, where you'll put some civvies on over the armor and be escorted to the drop-off."

"Wrex and I will be departing together," Garrus remarked. "When he splits off to meet with you, I'm going to be getting into position overlooking the meet. I'll provide sniper support and neutralize any marksmen that they get set up. The marines you leave with will be a safe distance away on standby."

"Sure seems like Wrex and I drew short straw," Kaidan said bitterly.

Garrus stared. "I'm not sure I follow," the Turian Spectre replied. "Straws?"

"It's an expression," Kaidan sighed. "Meaning that Wrex and I get the shitty job." He had forgotten what it was like to work with nonhumans. Constant explanation went hand-in-hand with figures of speech when aliens were present. The exception to this general tenet was Urdnot Wrex, who seemed to have an affinity for a plethora of coarse terms unique to the human race.

"Wrong, Alenko. I got the short straw when I was forced to bring a good for nothing prick such as yourself along on an important mission," Stillwater interjected venomously. "At any rate, you and Agent Vakarian are to head down to the armory get suited up."

Stillwater sat in his chair and Garrus gestured at the door. The pair exited the bridge and headed to the elevator which led to the armory. "Don't let him get to you," Garrus said. "He's got problems with me but he doesn't have the guts to voice them, since I actually hold rank here. You're a civilian; he can control you."

"I've dealt with assholes before, Garrus. Generally I'm a little more intoxicated, but you can't win 'em all."

"Is that what happened between you and Shepard? Alcohol? If you don't mind me asking, that is."

He did mind, but it would help his survival rating if his sniper support wasn't pissed off at him. The fact that he was even considering this made him feel fake, artificial. He didn't speak his mind; he told people what they wanted to hear to further his own ends.

"No, it's fine. Yeah, it was booze. I hit the drink after the war and we had a relationship-ending fight. I haven't seen her since." This wasn't entirely true. He hadn't seen her personally, but he had spoken to her a week after their altercation in the apartment.

"_It's me," her voice said over his answering machine. "Please, turn the monitor on. I know you're in there, Kaidan."_

_He pressed the bottle to his lips and switched on the audio feed. "Fuck you," he said, flipping it off again as he took another swig of beer. _

_The tone chimed again, indicating another incoming call. He let it ring until the answering machine picked up. "What's wrong with you?" she shouted at him. He could hear the pain in her voice and cared little. "I love you, Kaiden! I don't know why you're suddenly acting like this, but please, for the love of God, stop acting like this!" she cried. Her breath came out in audible little gasps, indicative of how distraught she was. _

_He turned the screen back on, looking her over quickly. Her makeup was running and her face was streaked with tears. She was in her quarters on the _Normandy_. "Why did you fucking save me?!" he roared. "Why!?"_

_"I love you!" she yelled again, pleading with him. "Please, can we just talk about this?" _

_He discarded the empty beer bottle. "No, Shepard. We can't talk about it. There's nothing to talk about. You ruined my life. I see Williams every night, damn it! I killed her, and you made me do it. I don't have anything to say to you."_

_"I saved you because I couldn't bear the thought of you dying. That was as scared as I've ever been, Kaidan; up on that catwalk, with you down by the bomb and Ash at the AA tower. You've got to know that if there was any way to save Ashley, I would have. Please," she begged, voice quavering with each syllable._

"_There was a way to save her. You're just too fucking selfish to have chosen it."_

_She sniffled, a tear rolling down her cheek. She brushed it off and straightened her shoulder-length red hair. "If that's how you feel, keep the goddamn apartment. I'm not going to fight with you about it. You're an asshole, Kaiden Alenko."_

_"And you're a bitch. Stay the fuck out of my life," he snarled, shutting off the monitor and taking a gulp of the strong liquor. In a hidden, subconscious part of his mind, Kaidan felt as if he may have just made the biggest mistake of his life. _

"Are you alright, Kaiden? The elevator's stopped," Garrus said, tapping him on the shoulder with a slender, three-fingered hand. Kaiden was unsure if memories simply worked at a faster speed than reality, or if the Alliance's elevator's simply sucked a big one. It was probably a combination of the two. At any rate, it wasn't a memory he liked to think about.

"Yeah. I'm fine. So what have you been up to?" Kaidan asked as they stepped into the armory.

"I went in for Spectre candidacy as soon as all the parties died down. They weren't going to refuse me. It's the kind of job I've always wanted. I never have to deal with all the nonsense that held me back at C-Sec. It's a license to accomplish my assignment, unfettered by all the red tape." It sounded as though Garrus hadn't changed much since the battle with Saren. Kaidan wondered absentmindedly how many people had been denied their rights by Garrus' license to accomplish his assignment.

"Sounds good," he lied. "Please tell me I'm going to be packing on this mission."

Garrus lifted a sniper rifle from a table, sighting it and testing its weight carefully. Satisfied, the Turian shrunk it down and attached it to his back. "Packing?" he asked, confused. "You're just going into the city. It's not far."

"Packing. Locked and loaded. Armed." Kaidan clarified as he shed his street clothes. He was still in decent shape. While he was indeed drunk more often than not, he still worked out occasionally. The repetition of exercises was a conduit to focus his mind on, and though he preferred to drink his problems away, he still hit the weights and the treadmill with relative frequency. His abs were not as defined as they had been when he was a marine, but the vague outline of a six-pack lingered.

The Turian shook his head, snapping Kaidan out of his reflection and answering his previous question. "I'm afraid not. This handoff needs to look real. It's even a stretch to let you bring an amplifier. That's a concession we've made for you, but a firearm is pushing it too far."

"Great," Kaidan remarked dryly as he stepped into the entry level Onyx armor he'd been approved for. It wasn't very protective, but it beat the hell out of walking into a firefight in street clothes.

"You seem pretty angry about this entire operation," Garrus noted as he grabbed a pistol from the table and holstered it. "I consider you a friend, Kaidan. You can speak your mind."

"I was done with operations, done with missions. I've got a lot on my plate, and dragging me into space, cutting me off from my vices, and getting me shot at isn't helping. I didn't ask for this."

"Your concerns are noted, Kaidan. If there were any other way for me to go about this, I would. But the council has left this assignment to me, and I'm going to complete it." Garrus' voice took on an edge of determination. Spectre status hadn't made Garrus any less driven; giving him unlimited jurisdiction and authority may have been in poor judgment.

"I understand that this is important; hell, I probably understand better than you do. I just wish I could sit this one out." Kaiden offered as he squeezed his jeans on over the armor. He pulled on his dark blue hoody over his torso. He typically favored a Jimmy Buffet-esque Hawaiian shirt on most days, but a short sleeved shirt would give away the fact that he was armored.

"Got it. These are the marines you'll be departing with," Garrus said, gesturing at a trio of heavily armed soldiers at another table in the armory. Two of them were the strapping young marines he had met at the airlock five days prior, and the third was a man closer to his own age. He had dark skin, short hair, and a rather impressive mustache.

"Alenko, it's good to meet you," the man said in greeting, his accent betraying him as a Brit. "The name's Barnes. Sergeant Barnes. This is Corporal Murray," he continued, nodding at one of the two marines, a stocky blonde man who nodded a greeting as he ran a last minute inspection of a rather wicked looking shotgun. "And this is Corporal Yuen," Barnes said of the third man, a large Asian man who was prepping grenades. Yuen muttered a hello, not looking up.

"Good to meet you," Alenko said without feeling.

So it went. Introductions gave way to briefings, which gave way to last minute loadout checks, which gave way to two small teams leaving the _Alexander_ a half an hour apart. So focused were the ground teams on the task at hand that none of them noticed a rather suspicious Turian in Hamalah's busy transit hub. Vargan, however, noticed them. The Turian waited until the coast was clear, and then let himself into the docking bay where the hapless _Alexander_ was docked.

* * *

Kaidan had broken off from the marines, and was to meet Wrex in a specified alley. Hamalah had proven to be a beautiful city. The architecture was gorgeous, rustic, and almost European in style. It was clearly a city of artisans, cultured people who took pride in where they lived. The locals also looked damn good, with dazzling asari strolling down lanes and haggling at street kiosks.

He strolled down a crowded street, acutely aware that he was in the minority here. It was more difficult to blend in when most everyone around you was blue.

He hadn't been an active combat for a long time, but he found that some of the old reflexes died hard. His eyes roamed the crowd constantly for anything appearing out of the ordinary. His right hand hung at his side, prepared to erect a biotic barrier at the slightest provocation. He also took great care to avoid being followed, painfully aware that his survival probably depended on it

_Relax_, he told himself. He was tense, nervous, and jumpy. Being tense, nervous, and jumpy went hand in hand with being pumped full of slugs, and that was never a good thing. He hadn't been in any real danger in two years, barring the siege in his apartment, and the time off from the business of war had served to make him a lot less comfortable with it.

The former marine abruptly changed directions, shrugging past a well endowed asari and slipping into the alley across from Maelana's, a popular watering hole. This was where he was to meet with the Krogan. He found the alley to be deserted. It was a warm day, so Kaidan took refuge in the shade while he waited for Wrex.

Alenko froze, a sudden realization taking him. He could disappear, right now. Walk away, away from Hackett's manipulation and all of this bullshit. There was nobody to stop him. He was sorely tempted to go get a drink at the bar and get the fuck out of here, but something kept him in the alley. _Conatix scientists screwed you over, Alenko. It's only natural that you want to bring those bastards down once and for all,_ he thought to himself. "Well," he mused aloud. "Alcohol hasn't hindered your revenge drive." He leaned against the wall with crossed arms.

"Where the hell is Wrex?" he muttered after some minutes had passed.

"Don't get your undies in a bunch, Alenko. I'm right here," the Krogan's voice rumbled as his hulking form strode into the alley. "Stopped and got a drink. Relax, I'm kidding," the Krogan finished as he saw Kaidan's blooming scowl. "Actually, I did you a favor. Stopped at a shop and bought you some firepower," the Krogan drawled, producing a small handgun and passing it to Alenko.

Alenko eagerly took the gun and put it in the large pocket on the front of his hoody. "That's another one I owe you for," he remarked, the added weight of the weapon cutting away a bit of the anxiety he had been feeling. If only all of his problems could be solved so easily.

"Were you followed?" Wrex asked warily; hand on his shotgun as he glanced out at the street. "There are a lot of ways that this could go wrong."

"I've been out of the fold for a while, but I don't think so," Kaidan replied. "Where's the meet?"

"Plain view. There's a courtyard a few blocks south. Big area, pretty heavy traffic. Your marine buddies have set up shop in a café with a good view of the handoff. The Turian should be in position now too. The meet's in fifteen minutes. We should go." Barnes and his cohorts weren't necessarily his buddies, but he didn't argue. He owed Wrex a great debt, both for saving his life and arming him.

"Got it," Kaidan replied, butterflies in his stomach acting up as the impending gun battle drew nearer. It wasn't a matter of if. The whole plan involved a gunfight. People were going to die in fifteen minutes, and there was a good chance that he would be one of them.

They moved back out onto the streets, Alenko walking a couple feet in front of the big Krogan. He tried to look tense and edgy to sell the idea of his captivity to anyone who happened to be observing them. It turned out to be an easy act to put on. His mind raced feverishly as they walked, recalling and recommitting to memory the techniques that triggered his various biotic talents. He hadn't been allowed an omni-tool, which also would have been useful, so he wanted to make sure that his biotics were firing on all cylinders.

The duo arrived at the courtyard a few minutes later. Less crowded than other areas of the city, it was a pretty place. A large fountain bubbled at the center of the courtyard, capped by a statue of a lithe asari. The elaborate architecture of the surrounding buildings provided a number of ideal places for snipers. Kaidan hoped to God that Garrus had found a good spot and would be able to provide effective cover, and that the Barnes and his troops were close enough to get here as soon as it started to go down. .

Wrex began to handle him more roughly, grabbing him by the shoulder and pushing him as they neared the fountain. They stood by the trickling structure for a few moments until Kaiden saw Wrex turn his gaze to a building along the perimeter of the courtyard. Five people stepped out of the open door and walked in a tight formation.

Four of the new arrivals were clutching assault rifles. Three of these men were human; the last one was Turian. This trio walked side by side in front of an asari who seemed to be in charge.

"Excellent," the slender alien said appraisingly as the group approached. "This is Alenko, correct?"

"Yeah. I got him. It took some doing, but here he is," Wrex replied, playing his role perfectly. "Little bastard killed the other three mercs you hired."

"Really?" The asari sounded surprised. "That's very impressive. You've done commendable work, Mr. Wrex."

_She's fucking buying it, _Kaidan thought to himself giddily. The course of action everyone had decided on earlier was to let Garrus take the first shot and try to take the gang by surprise, allowing Wrex and Kaidan to get started on them while the marines rushed to the scene.

"Commendable, huh? Transfer the credits to my account and then we can talk about another job, if you've got it." Kaidan fought off a smile. The Krogan was trying to get the money for capturing him before the battle began, effectively fucking over his previous employers, whoever they were.

"No, Mr. Wrex. I'm afraid our future contracts are reserved for Mr. Vargan." An icy chill gripped Kaidan. As if to further solidify the deep unease that the asari's statement had carried, an explosion rocked a building down the street.

"Holy shit!" Kaidan exclaimed in spite of himself. This was bad. Very bad.

Wrex's shotgun snapped up. "What the fuck was that?" he asked threateningly.

"It sounded a great deal like an explosive killing your Alliance marine friends," the asari said with a wry smile. Civilians poured out of the square, flooding down the street as dust rose into the air. Cries of the wounded and dying could be heard, and Kaidan felt sick to his stomach.

"In a moment your ship will meet a similar fate," the alien continued smugly. "Vargan is seeing to that right now."

"You bitch!" Kaidan roared, activating his biotic barrier with his left hand and whipping out the handgun. Both sides opened fire. Wrex took a dive behind the fountain and Kaidan allowed his barrier to soak up some slugs while the Krogan did this. He feathered the trigger of his handgun while following Wrex's lead and trying to get behind cover, but the shots went wide due to the damnable shaking of his hands. The enemy took cover, embedding behind the opposite end of the fountain.

A large chunk of rock was blasted out of the fountain mere inches away from his head. The shot had come from atop a building. Kaidan turned his attention there as Wrex popped out from cover and took a potshot across the fountain. Another sniper shot rang out and a man fell off the building Alenko was looking at. _Thanks, Vakarian, _he thought as he stood and fired a pair of shots. Mercifully, his aim had been true, and both shots hit their intended target, a human merc. The second slug depleted the mercenary's kinetic barriers, as indicated by the large bullet hole that appeared in his armor and the arterial spray that accompanied it.

"Suck on that!" Alenko yelled defiantly before a burst of automatic fire forced him back behind their decaying cover.

"The asari is gone," Wrex growled. "She hauled ass as soon as this started." Blue energy rippled across the Krogan's back as another sniper opened fire from behind them.

Alenko spun and focused a mass effect field atop the building the shot had come from and was pleased to see a sniper rapidly levitating into the air, until his ascent was cut short by a sniper round from the Spectre. The corpse's path became a horizontal one. After a few second's the field wore off and the dead sniper fell to the pavement with an unsettling _thud_.

A grenade detonated over the fountain, blowing apart the statue and showering Kaidan and Wrex with debris. Alenko's barrier had worn off and the blows staggered him. Dazed, Kaidan could only watch as the Turian mercenary hopped into the fountain and begin charging, assault rifle spitting rounds as he approached. Wrex let out a rumbling chuckle as he popped out from behind the fountain and fired his shotgun. The buckshot disabled the Turian's shield and tore a big chunk out of his chest. His sprint rapidly slowed, until he went face first into the water.

If Alenko had counted kills correctly, this left two human mercenaries alive, excluding any snipers that remained. A sniper shot exploded from the rooftop and a scream echoed from the opposite end of the fountain. _Make that one,_ he corrected. _Thanks again, Garrus_. He turned to Wrex and made a hand signal indicating that they split up and circle the fountain, coming around the man's flank. The Krogan nodded agreement and began creeping around the structure.

"I give up!" the mercenary yelled, casting his rifle aside and standing up, hands in the air.

Alenko rose and leveled his pistol at the man as he closed the distance between them. Wrex stood and approached them. "Who do you work for!?" Kaidan yelled, shoving the pistol under the man's jaw.

"I'm just a mercenary!" the man groaned.

"Wrong answer, chief," Alenko said, pulling his gun away and backhanding the man with it, snapping his head to the side. "I'm not going to ask again."

"Things are strictly need-to-know, and I don't need to know. I work for the asari you saw. Mihra Alnatus."

"Shoot him in the leg and see if his story changes," the Krogan instructed him.

The mercenary whimpered. "Please. I swear, Mihra Alnatus is her name and she knows more than I do. I don't want to die."

"Where did she go?" Kaidan demanded. It seemed that the man was telling the truth. His utter lack of poise suggested that he really was terrified, and was willing to squeal like a pig to save himself. The man was about to speak when Garrus Vakarian strode up to them, still carrying his rifle.

"Good job, you two," Garrus said. "I got down here as soon as I could. What should I tell Stillwater? He needs to be informed of what's going on."

Kaidan's eyes widened. "Shit!" he exclaimed as it all came back to him. "There's a bomb on the _Alexander_!"

* * *

Stillwater paced the bridge, brow furrowed. A medical team had been dispatched the second contact had been lost with the fireteam, escorted by a pair of marines. He didn't like losing men, and he had the distinct feeling that Barnes, Murray, and Yuen were dead. The last sound the radio had picked up was a violent explosion, so the captain feared that the medical team's job would be a simple bag and tag.

"Stillwater!" the bridge comm array crackled. The entire bridge staff seemed to lean toward the sound, eager for news of what had happened. "This is Agent Vakarian. Things aren't looking good here. You need to get everyone off the ship immediately!"

Stillwater froze. "Why?" he asked calmly as a choking fear spread throughout him. He was afraid he knew what Garrus was about to tell him.

"The merc from the Citadel is on Thessia and we have reason to believe that he's planted explosives on or near the _Alexander_. Everyone needs to get off that cruiser." This was exactly what Stillwater had been afraid he would hear.

"Damn it," the captain swore. "Go to red alert status!" he barked at the first officer, who entered the command on his console. Red lights began flashing throughout the ship, accompanied by a blaring klaxon. "Put me on the intercom."

Stillwater felt like he was going to throw up. Nineteen years commanding ships, and this was it. He knew that the ship wasn't going to be evacuated in time. There were simply too many crewmen. It was his duty to stay aboard until the last member of his crew was safely off the ship, and that wasn't going to happen. How had they missed something this big? How was a mercenary able to get close enough to his ship to blow it up?

The skipper activated the intercom and Stillwater cleared his throat. "This is Captain Stillwater," he began, speaking quickly to facilitate a speedier evacuation. "There is a bomb on this ship and everyone needs to evacuate immediately. Proceed to the nearest exit to your position and get off the ship imme-"

A series of massive explosions ripped through the vessel, cutting Reginald Stillwater's announcement short, and also ending his life.

* * *

Good. She had put some distance between herself and the explosive firefight. Hopefully her men would be able to contain the threat themselves, but something about the Krogan told her that she would need to try again. He was a real threat, that Krogan. However, Mihra Alnatus had the means to dispose of such a threat.

Hamalah belonged to her. She controlled this city and everyone in it. Wrex and his human ally were alone in this city, without a ship and without backup. Mihra Alnatus had backup in spades, and it was time to call it in.

She activated her communicator. "Hamalah Security," an asari voice said over the device. "Please state the nature of the emergency."

"This is Security Chief Alnatus," she replied. "I need security teams mobilized throughout the city. They should be on the lookout for a large Krogan and a rather unremarkable looking human. They are responsible for the bombing in the city and the destruction of a Systems Alliance vessel in port, the _SSV Alexander_. The Krogan should be shot on sight, but the human needs to be kept alive for questioning. Understood?"

"Of course, ma'am," the dispatcher agreed. "Security teams will be mobilized immediately."

"Good," Mihra Alnatus said with a wry smile. "Very good. Chief Alnatus out."


	6. The Calm between the Storms

Author's note: Hello again, folks. Sorry this didn't get out quite as quickly as I hyped you all up for, but I had some stuff going on that has now been dealt with. Anyway, this is sort of breather after last chapter's gun battles/explosions, so expect some character development and things along those lines. Here, without further adue, are the responses to last chapter's reviewers.

Zing-baby: Thanks for the great review! That kind of thing really motivates me to get off my ass and continue this thing, knowing that the fic has fans who really want to see it keep going. Yeah, Stillwater definitely got the short end of the explosion.

AFlockOfBunnies: Wow, I'm glad you liked it so much. As I said above, things like that are basically why I've maintained interest in writing this. Before I started using this site, most of the stories I attempted to write fell vicitim to boredom and disinterest, but the fact that people are reading and enjoying this make it seem like a lot better use of my time. On a completely unrelated note, Microsoft shipped me a refurb 360, so I'm no longer going through withdrawal lol.

Before I stop blathering, please note that I've changed the genre on the story description thingy to straight up Sci-Fi. I felt like drama/romance seemed really kinda specific. While the romantic angle really is an important part of this yarn, also important is the whole Conatix revival element, the mission, and basically all the other plot threads I'm rolling with. I guess what I'm trying to say is that the subject matter here varies enough that I felt that the "sci-fi" moniker was a little more apt. I'd like to again say (as if it wasn't made clear above) that reviews are always greatly appreciated! Now that that's out of the way, I'll leave you to it!

* * *

Chapter 6: The Calm between the Storms

_Killer behind you; his bloodlust defies all his needs. - Iron Maiden_

A sickening kind of dread hung in the air of the ruined plaza. Smoke still billowed from the remnants of the building that had been blown apart. It had been leveled. Barnes and his ground team never had a chance. Not a word had been spoken in the full minute that had elapsed since the final transmission of the good ship _Alexander_.

Wrex regained his facilities the quickest, regarding the lone survivor of their opposition coolly. "Where's that asari bitch?" he demanded of the mercenary. His voice was calm, reserved, but underneath it was a dangerous edge.

The mercenary whimpered, painfully aware of his dire predicament. "She's...head of Hamalah Security. The entire city's going to be looking for you."

"That wasn't the question. Where is she?" Garrus asked pointedly, hiding any discomfort the new revelation may have thrown into him in the interests of keeping the captive scared shitless. "You've got about three seconds to answer before I start shooting things off."

The mercenary paled, beads of nervous sweat dripping down his face. "You…you can't do that! Torture is…illegal! I know my rights!"

"There are two flaws in that logic, my friend," Garrus explained in an amused tone. "The first is that you assume that after you killed our comrades and destroyed our ship, we care about your rights. The second is that I'm a Spectre, and I was never obligated to allow you your rights in the first place." The Turian drew a handgun and shot a round past the man's head.

"The next one is taking your ear," the Spectre informed him. "Of course, my aim with a handgun isn't nearly as good as my aim with a rifle, so the ear might just be a conservative estimate." The man's eyes widened with fright as he considered the implications of the threat.

"Turian," the Krogan cut in. "It's time to go. The cops are bearing down on us and this guy either doesn't know anything or is going to take some more coaxing. Knock him out and we'll take him somewhere more secure."

"That's subtle," the Turian remarked sarcastically. "If you try to run," he said, turning his attention back to their captive. "I'll put a round through your head before you get five feet away. You're going to take us somewhere safe. Do you have anywhere that your boss wouldn't think to look? A safehouse?"

The hostage nodded quickly, shaken from the threat Garrus had issued to his auditory organs. "Yeah. The owner of a bar around here owes me a favor. You can hole up in the storeroom. It's not far. I don't know how safe it's really going to be for you though."

"What's wrong with Alenko?" Wrex asked suddenly. "Looks like he's seen a ghost." The former lieutenant hadn't said a word, hadn't even moved, since the final explosion.

Kaidan Alenko was back on Virmire. Hearing the explosion over the radio reminded him distinctly of another explosion, on another world; in another life. It was like Ashley Williams had died all over again. The ex-marine stood rooted to the spot, color drained from his face. They were all dead. All of them. Hanley, the youthful medical tech. All those crewmen who had been eating in the mess hall, chatting and laughing amongst themselves. The bridge crew, efficient and professional. Stillwater. The man had been an asshole, but he hadn't deserved this.

And Kate. Oh God, Kate was dead. Kate, with her pretty smile and bright eyes. Kate, the only person who had listened to him, really listened to him, in more than a year. Kate, who had tried to help him sort out his issues simply because she felt that it was the right thing to do. Oh God, how could this have happened?

"Oh my God," a voice yelled from down the street. "They're alive!"

Kaidan was snapped back to reality, turning to see four humans sprinting towards them. Two of them carried assault rifles, causing Kaidan to involuntarily reach for his gun. And then he saw Jake Hanley, running alongside none other than Kate Winters.

Wrex roughly grabbed the merc by the shoulder, preventing any attempt to flee during the confusion. "Are they from the ship?" he asked quietly, rightfully wary of new additions to the equation.

"Yeah," Kaidan laughed as a grin spread across his face. Thank God. She was alive.

"I think you'd better tell us what the hell is going on," one of the marines said as the groups convened. He was a man of average height and build who seemed to have maintained his composure to a greater extent than his compatriots. His fellow marine was drenched in nervous sweat and looked rather nauseous. Hanley looked about as terrified as Kaidan would expect from a youthful noncombatant in a situation like this, and Kate looked ragged and frightened.

"Soon," Garrus replied, beady eyes glancing down the street for signs of arriving law enforcement. "We need to get somewhere safe before we do anything." The Spectre turned his gaze on the captive. "You," he addressed the man coldly. "Take us there before I get impatient."

The mercenary nodded once, a small, frightened little gesture. Wrex released him with a shove. He regained his footing and began walking at a brisk pace, followed by the ragtag band of survivors. Soon, the only people remaining in the plaza where the shootout had taken place were the corpses it had left behind.

* * *

The bar was closed for the night, and with Garrus' assurance that a large sum of credits would be transferred into her account, the owner had left for a hotel, leaving them run of the apartment above the bar. She would return to her home when they sent her the message that they were done using the place. Everyone had a price, and this particular asari's was a meager two hundred and fifty thousand credits.

They had immediately set about fortifying the building for the distinct chance that Hamalah law enforcement agents would be kicking the door down at any given time. The curtains had all been drawn, the tables and all been put in front of the windows, and the ground floor was guarded in shifts.

It was the dead of night. Kaidan wasn't sure what the rotation cycle was on Thessia but it wasn't a time where much activity was happening in the streets. He was presently upstairs, sitting on a plush sofa.

Wrex and one of the marines, Corporal Elsberry (the one who had looked terrified earlier), were down in the bar on watch. Up here in the apartment, their mercenary captive was locked in a closet in the asari's bedroom with the other marine, the composed Corporal Ian, sitting outside it to make sure he didn't try anything.

Garrus was fiddling with his communicator in the kitchen, trying to expand the signal strength to get word out to the Citadel. Using the extranet to relay the message was too easily traceable by the authorities. Hanley was pretty shell-shocked, and had gone to sleep in what seemed to be a guest room. This left Kaidan, presently unoccupied, alone with Kate in the living room.

There wasn't much by way of food in the apartment, at least by human standards, but Kaidan had cracked open a beer from the bar and was currently basking in its mildly alcoholic glory. He was too much of a boozer to get a buzz from a single can of beer, but the mere act of consuming alcohol brought him an inexplicable measure of comfort, akin to reuniting with an old friend.

"You're on watch in a few hours, Kaidan. You really shouldn't be drinking," Kate chided him. She was taking the loss of the ship hard, but there was still enough doctor in him to argue against his drinking.

"Wrex is down there guarding the front door right now. He already told me this was the only one he was letting me take. Besides, don't we want my hands steady when I'm on watch?" His hands were still fucking shaking, and it was driving him crazy.

"I'm sorry," she replied weakly. "God knows I wouldn't mind a drink. This is bad. Really bad. I've never really been in danger before. Can't say I like it."

Kaidan was never much of a people person. Back before the _Normandy_, he had always guarded himself from the world, never allowing himself to form attachments and never under any circumstances shedding his encompassing self-control.

It was the self-control that had been born of the catastrophic ending of his time at Brain Camp. He had taken that one hard. Killing Vyrnnus had been an impulsive outburst on his part, a spur of the moment attempt to protect the girl he loved. It had instead buried whatever may have been. Rahna was a gentle girl; seeing Kaidan kill a man, even in her defense, was too much for her to take. That lapse in discipline had cost him dearly, leading to the rigid self-control of pre-_Normandy_ Kaidan Alenko.

It was funny, really. Before the _Normandy_, he had been so controlled, so reserved. Shepard taught him to lighten up, smell the roses, live life. His long talks with her helped him soften his rigid discipline, had allowed him to relate to people again.

Then the bitch pulled the rug out from under him. His relationship with her ended the life of Ashley Williams, undoing what had been done. His faith in people was shattered, and after the _Normandy_, Alenko became a misanthropic drunkard. No, Kaidan Alenko was not a people person.

So, when he decided that he should say something to comfort Kate, he found that he couldn't really think of anything. He could tell her that it would be alright, but that was so far into the realm of cliché that he didn't even want to consider it. It was also probably a lie. He fully expected to be dead before the week was out. Sooner or later, the cops would find them and they would have to make a stand. What could he tell her?

She was going through the worst ordeal of her life. He had to put on a brave face, get her smiling, try to lighten things up. The last thing he wanted to do was mention his own baggage, as that wasn't a comfort to anyone, least of all himself. Setting Ashley's face aside, at least for a little while, Kaidan started the comfort the best way he knew how.

"It'll be alright, Kate," he said, lying through his teeth. "I've been in worse scraps before." Yes, he had been in worse scraps before. They had resulted in a permanent state of "fucked up in the head," but he had indeed survived them.

She smiled a little bit. "It'll be alright," she repeated. "And they're going to find Hoffa, one of these days." Kaidan was a bit taken aback by the reference. Jimmy Hoffa had disappeared in the 1970s, and he was surprised that someone whose father hadn't been Marcus Alenko, historian extraordinaire, would know this.

"History buff?" he replied with a raised eyebrow.

"A little bit," she responded, her smile widening playfully. "You?" This was good. Get her talking about something, _anything_ other than their present situation, and she would feel at least a little better. Why did how she felt matter to him?

This was a wholly hypocritical notion on his part. Kaidan didn't trust anyone anymore; this was his general tenet. He had trusted Rebecca completely, and that had ruined him. Why did he trust Kate? _Kate isn't Shepard, Alenko_, he thought to himself. _She's a good person, and you want to help her. It's not so strange, is it? _

"Me? Well, _I_ killed Hoffa. Time-space continuum stuff, pretty deep," he replied with a grin. "If I told you any more I'd have to kill you." Kaidan winced even as the words left his throat. _That was possibly the worst attempt at humor you've ever made,_ he thought to himself grimly. This left him with two options. _Damage control, Alenko. Either tell her about Dad or tell The Aristocrats._

He decided against the legendary joke, choosing a more earnest approach to recovering from his futile stab at lightening the mood. "Sorry. My dad made a hobby of it. I didn't pick up too much when I was little, but after brain camp closed down I lived at home for a while before enlisting. He was always listening to 20th century music, or watching 20th century films, or reading encyclopedia entries on the net. Kinda rubbed off, I guess."

"I minored in history in college," she replied. "My mother was like that, always talking about how history was part of who we are, and that the more we knew about it the more we knew ourselves. I fell in love with all that stuff. The Civil Rights Movement in America, things like that."

"My dad's specialty was a little less serious in nature," Kaidan replied with a nostalgic smirk. "Mostly just pop culture, really. He could quote you _Aliens_, backwards and forwards. Kind of an ironic movie nowadays, I guess."

"Game over, man!" Kate replied, doing a fair Bill Paxton. "Game over!" It was a poor choice of quotes, considering that a spaceship crash had been what provoked Corporal Hudson's outburst in the film. Still, he appreciated the reference, and laughed. They both laughed, and for a short while, the hopelessness of their situation seemed a distant memory.

* * *

"You've done well," Mihra Alnatus' voice said over Vargan's communicator. "The humans are on the run."

The Turian mercenary sat in his recently acquired apartment. The previous owners lay dead next to the coffee table upon which he rested his feet as he spoke with Alnatus. All it had taken to acquire temporary lodging was a ring of the doorbell. He had forced his way in and driven his combat knife, a talon-type blade popular with military units, deep into the asari's sternum. He brought his pistol to bear on another asari who had risen with a frightened cry from the couch he presently lounged on.

She had backed away from him, dropped to her knees, and begged. The Turian had ended her life with a rapid twist of her neck, wiping the talon clean of her partner's blood before he let her corpse drop to the floor.

The past few days had been delightful. Everything since the botched Citadel job had been smooth, enjoyable, and simple. He had added a substantial chunk to his lifetime kill count with a single explosion, and he been paid lavishly to do so.

Vargan hadn't always been a merc. Back in his younger days, the savage Turian had been a proud soldier in the grand army of his people, a rigidly disciplined fighting force to match any in the galaxy. Even then though, Vargan had taken a great deal of pleasure in killing. It was the ultimate rush; possessing the power to take a life, utterly end another being's existence. Exercising this power became a fascination for the Turian. He became damn good at it.

His fascination had remained secret for some years. Vargan possessed respect, money, and status as a decorated war hero. He was given command of a small, four-man vessel that was tasked with peacekeeping in Citadel Space. This all changed when he led a raid on a band of pirates set up in the Argos Rho cluster.

Graham Faraday had run a very small time operation. He stole ships through typically non-violent means and ransomed the inhabitants off at modest fees. Faraday lacked ambition, and he also seemed to lack the mean streak required to run a long-term criminal operation.

Vargan and his men had been sent after the gang with explicit orders to apprehend them alive if at all possible. After landing on the planet, the commandos made entry into the bunker where the gang was situated. The pirates promptly surrendered, throwing down their weapons and agreeing to come peacefully.

Vargan killed them all, and when his troops questioned his actions, he killed them too. He returned to his vessel and destroyed it, leaving in the ship the pirates used for their raids. On that day, Vargan's life as a soldier ended and his life as a hired gun began.

He began his career simply, taking jobs for two-bit crime bosses. Any job would do, as long as it paid well and allowed him to get his hands dirty. His reputation in the underworld community grew with his body count. As his notoriety expanded, he began to receive contracts from wealthier employers. He had assassinated for corrupt politicians and murdered for bent cops. His new arrangement with Mihra Alnatus and her employers had proven to be his most lucrative prospect to date, and he intended to milk it for all it was worth.

"Yes," he replied, mind returning to his conversation with Mihra Alnatus. "Their backs are to the proverbial wall. Your security teams are looking for them?"

"Yes," she confirmed. "I expect to have them within a few hours. We'd like to continue to employ you, Mr. Vargan. Your work has been commendable. We have another target that we need brought to us alive."

"Your people won't capture Alenko," he said softly, flipping his knife about in his slender fingers absentmindedly. "Not while Urdnot Wrex draws breath. I didn't fight him for long, but it was all I needed to know that that Krogan is unstoppable. He'll kill anything you throw at him. Fuck your target. I'll kill Urdnot Wrex for 300,000 credits."

"That hardly seems in my best interests, Mr. Vargan," the asari replied, obviously annoyed. "My teams are in the process of locating them even now. By midday tomorrow, the Krogan will be dead and Alenko will be in my possession."

"We'll se," the Turian replied dismissively. "I'm in no hurry. You know how to reach me when you decide you want to play ball." He killed the feed with a chuckle. Wrex would annihilate her security teams. He was sure of it. Then the hunt would begin.

* * *

Alenko sat quietly on the couch, making a half-hearted attempt at sleep. Kate had dozed off a little while ago, but the shock of the _Alexander_'s destruction, along with the adrenaline that had filled him during the gunfight, refused to let him go. Instead, he fiddled with his gun, disassembling it and reassembling it over and over, trying to beat his own times.

It was a game that marines often played with themselves when they found sleep impossible and had nothing else to occupy them. It kept the hands working and the repetition often aided in drifting off to sleep. He had yet to come close to his previous record, back when he had been a gainfully employed soldier of the Alliance. Even his previous record had nothing on that of Ashley Williams. She could break down and put together a handgun before you could blink. He tried to dispel her from his mind, aware that thinking about her would only bring him pain.

"Kaidan," Garrus' voice said from the kitchen, startling him out of his Zen-like concentration. "Come here."

He rose from the couch, careful not to wake up Winters, and reattached the pistol to the hardpoint on his left thigh. He stepped into the kitchen to see Garrus' handheld communicator lying on the table with various wires sticking out of it. Garrus had taken it apart and rewired it, and the results certainly didn't make for a prettier device. Hopefully, he had gotten the necessary functionality out of it.

"Any luck?" he asked, pulling a chair out from under the table and sitting.

Garrus shrugged. "I was able to expand the signal strength significantly, but it's not going to reach the Citadel. I'd say we're good for about a hundred lightyears. I coded the frequency to an secure emergency Spectre channel. My hope is that someone is nearby and will be able to get here."

Kaidan sighed. "Bit of a crapshoot," he remarked. "What are the odds that somebody will be in range?"

"Pretty good," the Spectre conceded. "If anyone picks it up, we should be golden. The message explicitly warns against docking in Hamalah, so we're not looking at another blunder, at least. I've also given Alnatus' name, and her status as chief of security."

Kaidan raised a suspicious eyebrow. "Just how secure is your secure channel?" he asked skeptically. "If anybody else picks up that transmission we could be in a world of shit. They could follow the bread crumbs all the way back to us."

"Secure. Nobody without clearance has ever broken onto the secure emergency frequency. It's a triple encrypted code with an algorithm that constantly alters itself. The right way into it at time A will be moot within minutes, at time B. Without a password it would take a team of the galaxy's best hackers years to get into our system."

"You're in charge here, Garrus. What's our course of action if nobody is in range?"

"We don't have a lot of options, as I'm sure you're aware. A frontal assault on Hamalah Security HQ is about our only way to go from there. The Council wouldn't like that at all, but Mihra Alnatus has crossed the line, and I'm going to bring her down if it's the last thing I do."

"That's not a good idea," Kaidan replied. "We're no good to anyone if we get ourselves killed on a suicide run." _Besides,_ he thought to himself. _They wouldn't kill me. They want me alive for God knows what reason, and I'm sure as hell not going to waltz into their hands._

"It can be done with minimal losses if it's done right," Garrus answered him impatiently.

"Minimal losses?" Kaidan asked ironically. "A crew of two hundred is already dead. The mission can't come first anymore, Garrus. This is survival."

"The mission always comes first," Garrus retorted, voice raising. "It has to. Who knows how much is at stake here, Alenko? What are those scientists working on? It can't be good, can it? If we just drop the mission because a few people are dead, how many more could die?"

Kaidan made a quick mental count of the current occupants of this apartment. "At least seven people have would have a much better chance," he said dryly. "I'm not saying stopping these people isn't important. I'm just asking that you consider how much it's worth to you. Is it worth your life? Is it worth _all_ our lives? Just something to think about."

"Your concerns are noted," Garrus replied angrily. "Did you question Shepard like this?"

"I don't want to talk about Shepard," Kaidan said bluntly. "Don't ask me about her again." He hated to fight with Garrus, as he essentially liked the Turian, in spite of his flaws. Hell, it wasn't like he was perfect himself. This hadn't been what either man had intended at the start of this conversation. "Look, I'm sorry. I've got a lot on my plate. I just don't want to see any more of us get killed."

"I understand," Garrus said, softening. "This is only really an issue if nobody picks up our transmission anyway. With a little luck it won't even come to that."

Startling both of them as if on cue, Garrus' modified communicator crackled to life. At first only static came through, but Garrus quickly adjusted the bandwidth slightly to clean up the signal. They stared tensely at the device, waiting for further signs of life.

"Garrus?" a female's voice said over the radio. "Garrus, is that you?" Wait a second. He knew that voice. It was-_SHIT! _It couldn't be. Oh, it fucking couldn't be. _Please, God, let it be anyone else. Anyone!_ Kaidan suddenly found himself wishing for that full frontal assault on Hamalah Security. _You've got to be shitting me!_

"This is Shepard. I was in the neighborhood, and it sounds like you're in trouble. What's going on?"


	7. Old Wounds and New Wounds

Attention Readers: Before we get down to business with chapter 7, I'd like to extend my sincere apologies to anyone who's been inconvenienced by the extremely long period of time between updates. If you're an old reader, I'd like to personally thank you for sticking with it, despite my waiting far too long to update. I moved into college recently and have been very busy, but now that things are less hectic I hope to be able to get rolling on this. I may be wrong, but this chapter seems a bit shorter than some of the others, and I again apologize. I had some massive writer's block that is for the most part finished, but I think I may have subconciously taken it easy on this chapter. Thanks to my reviewers, as always, and here, without further adue, is Mass Effect: Redemption!

* * *

Chapter 7: Old Wounds and New Wounds

_Suffocation, waking in a sweat. Scared to fall asleep again in case the dream begins again. –_

_Iron Maiden_

Kaidan blinked, disbelieving. What were the fucking odds? Was it really possible that Rebecca Shepard was on the other line of Garrus' modified comm array? He glared at the speaker venomously, as if the device itself had willfully thrown his life into further chaos. Her face appeared in his mind's eye, the scars on her cheek from a knife fight in her youth back in the slums of Chicago doing little to mar her undeniable beauty. Her face was still vividly clear in his mind, a harbinger of the pain that crept through every fiber of his being when he thought of her.

"Damn, Shepard. It's good to hear your voice again," Garrus replied, mandibles clicking in amusement. "We're in a bit of a rough spot right now," he added.

_Bit of an understatement for this kind of shit-storm_, the former marine thought to himself glumly, dreading the inevitable unveiling of his presence here. This wasn't a reunion he relished. Not in the slightest. He hadn't spoken to Shepard in a long time. He thought of the last time he had spoken to her, that final exchange with her about a week after their major blowup.

_Shit, _Kaidan thought soberly. That had been a bit of a dick move on his part, however he felt about her. At any rate, the argument loomed.

"That's a hell of a chain of events," Shepard was saying as he shifted his focus back to the conversation at hand. Garrus had apparently summarized the crisis while he had been daydreaming. "What were you doing on Thessia?"

Garrus looked at Kaidan for approval, gesturing at the man with one hand and the radio with the other. Kaidan was surprisingly touched. The Turian had always been a brown-noser where Shepard was concerned. He had hung on her every word during the war, seeking advice at every turn. The fact that he was asking for Kaidan's consent to reveal the extent of the mission indicated that he felt sine camaraderie with the former marine.

Kaidan was at a loss for a response. Did he want to postpone the inevitable reveal, prepare himself for it? Or would it be better to simply get it over with? He shrugged, defeated, and nodded at the Turian. It was only a matter of time anyway.

"Wrex was hired to capture an L2 biotic and bring him to Thessia. A group of former Conatix scientists is harvesting them for a project that we're trying to learn the nature of. The Krogan was hired to bring in Kaidan Alenko," Garrus said, giving his fellow Spectre the heavily abbreviated version of events.

An awkward silence came over the room as Shepard took the information in. "That snake is with you?" she said with not a little venom dripping from her tone.

"The snake is right here," he said, mustering the will to speak. A million memories assailed him, memories of a beautiful world where some ugly things had happened. He remembered a gunshot piercing his armor just to the right of his heart. He remembered falling against the Salarian vessel's drive core, their makeshift nuke. Geth were converging on his position, terrifying in their silence. Cold, unfeeling, inhuman. Sergeant Jameson went down with half his face blown away, and Alenko knew they were fucked. He armed the device quickly as his movements became sluggish. _Goodbye,_ he had thought, assuming that Rebecca would make the right choice. The next memory Alenko had was of waking up in the _Normandy_'s med bay, good as new.

"You bastard," she said, all the good humor that speaking to Garrus had thrown into her chased away by his presence. "Do you know what you did to me?"

"I probably broke your heart," he replied honestly. He didn't say it with any satisfaction, for he felt none. In retrospect, he had been a bit harsher towards her than was necessary. He wasn't about to hug her and make up, but in all fairness, he owed her civility.

"Yeah," she replied, voice raising, filling with pent up rage. "You did. You broke my heart. I loved you, Kaidan, and you took that and stomped on it."

"You ruined me," he said softly.

"_I_ ruined _you_?!" she shouted. "Imagine loving someone more than anything and coming home after a long absence and having them tell you that they hate you, that they never want to see you again. Imagine that, you selfish piece of shit."

"I'm not going to get into this with you," he replied, deciding that a protracted argument did little to deter the numerous armed security officers no doubt scouring the city for them. It wasn't time to bury the hatchet just yet, but it was in everyone's best interest if it was set aside for a while. _Bullshit_, he thought to himself. Pragmatism had nothing to do with his change of topic. He was simply at a loss for a comeback. On some level, the bitch was right, and he didn't want to think about that."We're in some deep shit, and we need your help to get out of it. Don't doubt that I wish _any_ other Spectre could have picked up that transmission, but you're all we have right now."

"You're damn well going to get into it sooner or later," Shepard said scornfully. "Garrus. We can get to Thessia within a few hours. Do you want us to try and pull you out of there, or are we taking the fight to them?" Good. She had changed the subject, taken the focus off him.

"Uh, it's up to you," Garrus said, as always deferring to Shepard's opinion. Kaidan felt no great urge to listen to their strategizing. As far as he was concerned, they were all fucked, and the less time he had to spend listening to Shepard's voice, the more he would enjoy his final hours. He stood and left the kitchen, feeling numbed by what had just transpired.

What he really wanted was to go down to the bar and get good and shit-faced, but the big Krogan holding down the fort would have none of it. Instead, he sauntered back into the living room and sat down on the couch where he had been earlier. Kate was still asleep at the other end of the sofa, worried expression that she had worn since this morning yielding to a look of contentment. Sleep solved all kinds of problems, as far as most people were concerned. Kaidan couldn't even remember the last time he'd slept well unaided by pills or booze. He sighed, pulling his handgun from its holster. He began playing his little game, breaking down the weapon and putting it back together as fast as he could.

"What's wrong?" Kaidan jumped a bit, startled from his concentration. He turned to see Kate, sitting up, her face a mask of concern. "You look…distraught."

"That's an understatement," he replied, setting the reassembled gun down on the table in front of the couch. "Garrus got us some backup."

Kate's demeanor brightened visibly, eyes lighting up and tense muscles relaxing ever so slightly. "That's great!"

"He got Shepard on the horn," Alenko continued sullenly. "She's coming here." He cursed himself as a whiner, but knew that no amount of self-chiding would improve his mood.

Her smile faded. "I'm sorry, Kaidan," she said, scooting over on the couch, closer to him. "I can't imagine what you must be going through right now, but I'll try to help in any way I can. Pretend I'm not even here, just say whatever you need to get off your chest." She was so goddamned nice, so approachable. He felt like he could tell her anything without worrying for a second whether she would judge him for it.

"It's…I don't know. I just don't know anymore. I've been doing a lot of thinking, Kate. About Virmire. And Shepard. About how if it had been me back there, making a decision between Ash and her, I'd have saved Rebecca. It's easy to say I wouldn't have let my feelings cloud my judgment, but that's more than a bit hypocritical. The decision she made still ruined me in the long run, but I don't really know if she can be held accountable. I wronged that woman. I broke her heart. Talking to her kinda drove it home."

Kaidan wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, elbow bumping into Kate as he extended it. When had she gotten so close? "Things were going so well. I was sobering up a little bit, I was trying to dump some of this baggage. Then she's back, tearing away the old scabs. Thank God for you Kate. At least I have someone who'll listen. If I didn't, I don't-"

"You're a good man, Kaidan. It's easy to see. You do what you think is right, most of the time. We all need somebody to talk to." She put her hand on his shoulder, her touch sending a little chill through him. God, why did something as simple as a touch from her do that to him? _Leave it alone,_ he told himself. The last time he had let down his guard, let someone really know him, it had only ended in torment.

"I'm thankful. I don't know if I say it very often, but I'm really thankful for you," he replied, effectively telling his apprehension to go fuck itself. "You're…you're…" he began, looking for the words, when she kissed him.

She kissed him. For a moment, he sat there, dumbfounded. His body moved unbidden, arm wrapping around her back, feeling the tautness of her lithe frame. He began to respond, to kiss her back, still not sure what was going on or why. It had been a long time since he had been with a woman. He sat there passively, arm around her, as they kissed. Her hand reached around his back, and she suddenly broke away.

"I'm so sorry!" she said quickly, brushing a strawberry blonde lock out of her face, which was itself a mask of mixed emotions. "I don't know why I did that." She looked apologetic, yet also strangely rapturous.

"Don't worry about it," he replied. "You're special, Kate. I'd like to see where this goes, down the road. But right now might not be the best time for either of us." He noted a hurt expression on her face, and immediately felt guilty. He knew though, that it was not prudent to rush into something like this. Life was confusing enough as it was.

* * *

Neither of them noticed Jake Hanley, standing in the doorway of the guest room, with a look of profound pain coloring his features. He hung his head, turning back into the guest bedroom.

The closet was dark, but it was roomy enough. The mercenary, a man named Harold Lassiter was able to sit with moderate comfort inside it, taking a small measure of satisfaction in the likelihood that he wouldn't be in it for a very long time. In a few hours, he'd either be dead or free, depending on how things went down when Alnatus arrived on the scene.

His thoughts of attempting to break free from his captivity were stymied by a few unpleasant facts of the situation. The marine in the bedroom could be dealt with, if circumstances were right. But the Turian Spectre, the insane Krogan, and the biotic gave him pause. They were the Holy Trinity of horrible death; he felt certain he'd be blown away within thirty seconds of attempting an escape.

That was the first reason. The second reason was that he was doing more good right where he was. The Spectre was good, but apparently he wasn't _that_ good. He would have checked the merc's hardsuit, would have made sure that all possibilities had been taken into account.

Poor bastard didn't even suspect the tracking device that had been installed on the armor, leading the Asari's security teams right to them. Lassiter suspected that within a couple hours, a fully complemented Asari commando unit, courtesy of Hamalah Security and his employer, would be bearing down on the apartment. He chuckled to himself, apparently a bit louder than he intended.

"Shut the fuck up," the marine in the bedroom commanded. "Or I'll do it for you."

He quieted down, smirk still on his face, reveling in the knowledge that soon, the marine and all his allies would be dead.

* * *

Hanley wiped his eyes, which had welled with moisture. Three hours later and he was still crying! Lieutenant Alenko and Dr. Winters, _Kate_, had been kissing. Kissing! He'd worked with Kate closely for the entire year he'd served aboard the _Alexander_, had always wanted to ask her for dinner on one of their shore leaves. It seemed now that she was merely not interested, that his efforts would have been in vain.

"What a day," he muttered aloud. Jake sighed and sat down on the bed. He wasn't cut out for this. He belonged in a sickbay, dealing with simple problems, the kind of problem you could find a good solution to in a textbook. This was heavy shit he was in. Heavy shit. A lot of people had died today, good people, and then that son of a bitch had kissed Katie. He walked over to the window, sighing again as he approached.

It looked like a nice night for a walk. Thessia's moons shined bright amidst the smattering of stars, and the sky was clear of condensation. He glanced down at the streets. It was pretty late, so the sight of the dozen or so people down in front of the apartment gave him pause. "Wait…" he muttered to himself quickly. They were carrying guns! "Oh shit!" he shouted, hitting the deck as a gunshot shattered the window where his chest had been. The street below erupted in automatic fire. "Oh shit!" he said again.

* * *

A hail of bullets tore through the bars windows. Wrex dropped to the floor immediately as the weapons began to discharge. It was apparent that the security teams had found them. "Good," he rumbled as he raised his shotgun above him and fired blind through the opening. An Asari voice let out a pained holler and the big Krogan smiled.

Corporal Elsberry took cover behind the bar, a course of action that proved to be detrimental to his success. Gunfire rocked the wall behind him, shattering bottles and showering him with alcohol and shattering glass. Soon he became drenched in the stuff, as thousands of credits worth of booze spilled on him, dripping from his face and sliding down his sleek armor as he stayed low, waiting for a pause. The opportunity came and the young corporal popped up, assault rifle blaring. He sighted an Asari and squeezed the trigger, firing a steady burst into her and bringing her down.

He failed to see another Asari taking aim at him. She fired her pistol once, blasting him with an incendiary round. The corporal looked down in horror as the alcohol, slick on his body, erupted in flames, rapidly snaking their way up. "Oh Go-earrghhhhh!!" he shrieked as the fire danced across his face, burning away flesh and hair, searing him irreparably. Another slug caught the corporal between the eyes.

Wrex shook his massive head and activated his biotic shield, rising to his feet. His shotgun roared defiantly, blasting again and again as the security team, seemingly made up entirely of Asari commandos, took cover behind their vehicles, which were little more than civilian model automobiles. Police. The Krogan staggered back a bit as a slug managed to breach the barrier. His armor deflected the projectile, but the impact of a high-velocity round hitting him square in the chest was still enough to knock him back.

He fell back, kicking over a table as he retreated deeper into the bar. Somehow, he managed to fit his considerable bulk behind the little piece of cover, and began to take stock of the situation. There were a good amount of them, but a lot of their fire seemed to be directed at the apartments upper level. Good. Let them shoot at the humans, ignoring the much greater threat one of the last great Krogan Battlemasters presented. That suited Urdnot Wrex just fine.

* * *

Corporal Ian fired his rifle nonstop, laying down as much suppressing fire as the weapon would allow. That was rule number one of group battle. If somebody was shooting at you, even poorly, you were going to be distracted. This would give the others the chance to clear the bastards out.

The bedroom was a good vantage point over the street, and it also was pretty decent cover, unless their assailants possessed a form of as-yet-unseen explosives. The corporal's finger pulled sharply on the trigger, firing a burst of rounds that caught one of the Asari clean through the chest. She writhed and twitched as the slugs tore through her, an effect known colloquially among the marines as the "Chaingun Cha-Cha." Corporal Ian chuckled. This was going pretty well, all things considered.

The gun began to overheat and he spun back behind his cover by the window, just in time to see the punch coming. Harold Lassiter, the mercenary they had locked in the closet, had managed to get out while Ian had been occupied. The blow took him by complete surprise, head snapping back into the wall. A blow from Lassiter's other hand caught him across the jaw, snapping his head to the side. In his shock, the smoking rifle clattered to the floor. His left hand reached for his knife, a standard issue Alliance blade, while he tried to get his other hand up to guard his face.

Lassiter grabbed the hand, pulling it away from his face as he managed to get his knife free. Ian pulled his left hand away, giving it room to bring the knife about. Lassiter caught his wrist with the other hand. Ian struggled but found himself being overpowered easily. He suspected that the mercenary's armor was equipped with motorized joints, giving him the edge in strength. A vicious head butt ended his rumination on the subject. The merc threw him by his arms, slamming the marine against the wall. He landed on the floor in a daze. He climbed to his knees and was brought back down by a savage right hook.

He landed on his stomach, spitting teeth. The mercenary kicked him brutally in the head. Ian could barely move, barely think. He'd never known pain like this. He felt as he was sure Rocky must have after going ten rounds with Ivan Drago in that old vid. He fumbled about with his left hand as the mercenary lifted his head, only to drive his face down into the floor, fingers closing around the knife.

"Fuck you," Ian managed, though it sounded more like "Fuh ooh." He stabbed at Lassiter's legs with the blade. The mercenary laughed, stomping his head. The thrust died mid-swing. Corporal Ian felt himself being lifted up off the ground, Lassiter's hands gripping his neck roughly. His vision began to darken as it became difficult to breathe. It felt like he'd always imagined drowning would feel, minus all the water. Things began to get fuzzy, blurry, until Corporal Ian knew no more.

* * *

Lassiter discarded the corpse casually, stooping to pick up the man's assault rifle. Things were looking up, until a familiar voice spoke from the doorway.

"Don't even try it, you piece of shit." The mercenary slowly stood up straight, turning to face the door with his hands up. Kaidan Alenko stood in the threshold, pistol trained at his head. The man's eyes blazed with hatred as he gazed at Lassiter. The mercenary spoke.

"Let's talk about this," he said calmly, speaking over the din of the still-raging battle. "You're a good man, Alenko. I know your type. Good men don't shoot unarmed men."

Alenko was nervous. He could see it, the uncertainty in his eyes. Alenko wasn't the kind of man to kill lightly. He was a good, upstanding, altruistic moron. He didn't have the balls.

"Pick up the rifle," Alenko commanded. Lassiter looked at the former marine quizzically. "I said _pick up the fucking rifle_!" he shouted

Harold Lassiter never took his eyes off Kaidan Alenko as he bent his knees, reaching for the weapon. He felt his fingers close around the handle, and then he felt nothing. Kaidan fired a single shot from his handgun, blowing the man's face away.

"No," he said grimly. "I don't shoot unarmed men, you son of a bitch."

* * *

Garrus fired round after round with his sniper rifle, but he didn't have a clean shot at any of the Asari. Things were looking bad. Everyone had heard Elsberry die, and Kaidan had just informed him of Corporal Ian's demise. They were running out of shooters, but their assailants still had at least eight. "Wrex!" he barked into his communicator. "What's the situation down there?"

The Krogan's reply was drowned out by a shotgun blast, which Vakarian took as a sign that Wrex was fine.

Kaidan came running back in, clutching Ian's rifle as he slid against the wall on the other side of Garrus' window. "We're down to three, excluding Kate and Hanley. Odds aren't in our favor, Garrus," he said as he set the rifle down and drew his pistol.

"A three-man fireteam can accomplish a lot," Garrus reminded him.

"True," Kaidan remarked, preparing to pop into the window and lay down some fire. "But Shepard was in that fireteam, if you recall." He spun out, firing a single shot before his eyes widened and he went back behind cover. "Speak of the devil," he said breathlessly.

Confused, Garrus hazarded a peek outside. Marching down the street, all guns blazing, were a pair of marines and Commander Rebecca Shepard, at the nick of time. So, the cavalry had arrived. Why did Kaidan feel like it was going to cause more problems than it would solve?"


	8. Getting the Hell Out of Dodge

Okay, here it is. Chapter 8. I'm again really really sorry to anyone who enjoys this, because I really am a bit of a bastard when it comes to getting new chapters out. I'm so sorry, and I'm really going to try to be more regular about it, because its not fair to you guys. Anywho, here's the new chapter, I hope you like it. It's a bit short again because i've just been so busy.

Chapter 8: Getting the Hell Out of Dodge

_That's great, it starts with an earthquake. –R.E.M._

_Blackened is the end. -Metallica_

Kaidan peered from the side of the window, down the lane at Shepard and her squad. The marines who flanked her seemed to be of the ilk Shepard usually took with her; support soldiers who could supplement her more than adequate martial proficiency with hacks and biotics. The man behind her glowed bright blue and tossed an Asari commando head-first into the building across the street. She landed in a heap, head twisted in a way that no head was meant to. The man had to be an L3. In his prime, Kaidan would have put her clean through the wall.

The other marine was a woman who worked furiously on an omni-tool, causing all manner of technological blunder as the security team's weapons shorted out, their shields were sapped, and their biotics jammed.

Shepard's assault rifle rarely ceased firing, modded as it was to reduce concerns of overheating. She cut a swath through the Asari ranks, heavy battle armor absorbing any slugs her shields could not. She waded into the fray, gun roaring, and simply ended the battle. Within a few moments, six Asari were dead, one was bleeding to death from four gunshot wounds, and the final one had surrendered, hands in the air and guns on the ground.

Kaidan found himself marveling at the woman's prowess. Even after the dozens of engagements he'd seen her fight in, her blitzkrieg tactics still impressed. She spared little time in a firefight, going straight for the jugular and not letting up for a second. It was like a floodgate opened, and God help anybody in the water's path.

"Damn," he said in wonder.

"Damn," Garrus concurred. The pair of them moved downstairs to find Wrex inspecting the charred corpse of Corporal Elsberry. The Krogan grunted and went outside with them.

Shepard was approaching the Asari with a raised handgun, having put her rifle away after the battle. "Call your boss. Tell her your mission was a success. "Do whatever it takes to get her to come here right now." Kaidan felt truly sorry for the captive. Shepard wasn't a nice person at all when it came to people she deemed guilty of something. The gangs she had run with had instilled in her a strong sense of "eye for an eye," and while she was compassionate to those in need, Kaidan had seen the Spectre dole out a more permanent brand of justice than was typically allowed on occasion. Two hundred Alliance crewmen were dead. Such justice was probably imminent.

"I will not," the Asari replied, shaking her head defiantly. "I am loyal to Mihra Alnatus."

Shepard turned her gaze to the wounded Asari, coughing and bleeding on the ground. She leveled her pistol and the fallen commando and shot her twice more before leveling the pistol back on her captive. "That'll be you in a minute. Call her."

The blue-skinned alien smiled. "No. What will happen if you kill me? A larger unit will be sent, and so it will go until you are dead. You need me, little girl."

Shepard lowered the pistol and shot the commando through the leg. The Asari let out a shriek and pressed both hands to the wound, rebalancing on her left foot. This proved a mere delaying tactic as the next round hit her in the left knee, bringing her down, a sobbing mess.

"This little girl just put you in a wheelchair, bitch. Now call your goddamn boss before I decide to hurt you some more. I want her here."

The Asari looked up at Shepard, tears streaking her face and blood pumping from her legs. "Medi...gel," she gasped through the pain.

"Rico," Shepard addressed her engineer, who applied medigel to the wounds. "She has to be able to speak, after all."

The Asari tapped her wrist communicator.

"Alnatus," the unmistakable voice of the Asari criminal spoke through the device. "Status update?"

The commando glanced up at Rebecca Shepard to make certain that there was indeed a pistol trained at her forehead, and replied. "She's coming for you, Ma'am. You need to get out of Hamal-"

Shepard cut her off with a single gunshot. The Asari slouched backwards, quite dead. "Alnatus," Shepard said coldly, gripping the dead alien's wrist to her face to use the communicator. "This is Rebecca Shepard. You're going to tell me what the fuck is going on. And you're going to tell me now."

"Or what?" the Asari scoffed derisively. "You'll fight your way through the damned city to kill me? I've news for you, Spectre. I'm no longer on the planet's surface, and the planet will soon cease to be."

Shepard's eyes narrowed, and Kaiden felt a sinking feeling in his gut, a horrible kind of déjà vu. He'd heard similar words from Mihra Alnatus before, and she didn't seem like the type to fuck around.

"We'll see," Shepard replied, ending the communication. "Joker," she said, tapping her own comm device. "Get on the horn with Asari high command and tell them to begin immediate evacuation of Thessia. It looks like we're heading straight into a shitstorm."

* * *

Vargan stood on the bridge of the _Graviton_, the keystone of the entire affair. This was the ship that would rock the galaxy, or so he was told by the Asari security chief. She'd flown him out here with her on a private shuttle, and they now maintained position a good ways outside of Thessia's orbit. The organizer of the whole thing wasn't aboard the vessel, putting command in the hands of a severe Turian named Kravar. Vargan saw much of himself in Kravar, his poise, his grit. Kravar was not an artist, however. Vargan's kills were personal, close-up. The mercenary had little respect for ship warfare, but even he recognized the power of _Graviton_.

"Shepard is on the surface," Alnatus said, entering the bridge. "We're going to have to move to phase two."

Kravar looked up at her, mandibles clicking in agitation. "We need some time to arm the weapon," he replied. There seemed to be an unspoken hostility between the two, Vargan noted. Perhaps there was racial tension, or perhaps their ideologies simply did not see eye to eye. One thing was certain. They were united in their love of credits. This outfit clearly had ambitious goals and paid its agents well. Vargan was glad to be a part of such a unique organization, though its purpose was yet unknown to him. He had signed on during the ride over here. Alnatus finally decided to recognize his invaluable talent and offered him a more static position. He had told her to double her price, and accepted the offer once she agreed.

"How long?" she asked irritably. "Things are escalating and I'd like these damned Spectres to be dealt with."

"About an hour," came the reply. "You heard the lady, get to work!" he barked at the bridge crew. "I want the device operational!"

The mercenary clicked his jawbones in amused curiosity. This would certainly be a show worth seeing.

* * *

Hysteria gripped the streets of Hamalah. People ran, screaming, crying; mothers searching for their children; children crying for their mothers. Humans cursing their rotten luck; Turians bearing it all in stoic silence. Looting, gunfire, explosions.

They ran through the streets, pushing through the throngs of terrified people, blocking out the wailing sirens, the sirens that had never been sounded before. Planetary evacuation. It was unheard of, unplanned for. A lot of people were going to die if Alnatus was true to her word. It was simple mathematics. A lot of people lived on Thessia, and a lot of said people did not own ships. There were barely enough ships at port to get an eighth of the population to safety, even assuming these ships would be filled and gone before whatever was going to happen happened.

Kaidan gripped his pistol, pulling Kate by the wrist, trying to stay as close to Wrex as possible, who was in turn following Garrus and Hanley. Shepard and her marines were in the front, and they all moved as fast as they could. The port wasn't much further, but it had been a good twenty minutes since the battle and time was short. Alenko had no idea what the Asari had whipped up, but it wasn't a threat one could ignore. Despite the improbability of anything destroying the entire planet, Alnatus had been as good as her word when it came to the _Alexander_, so it would be foolish to dismiss her threat.

Kate's face was a mask of fear, and Kaidan truly felt for the woman. She'd been through hell. Her and Hanley both. At least he'd been in rough spots before, knew how to handle conflict. But those two were civilians, used to seeing wounds in their infirmary. That was as close as they came to the front. This chaos was new to them, and obviously taking its toll. Kaidan shook the thoughts from his mind, deciding to focus on not getting blown up for the moment. The former marine decided that if he lived through this, all the soul-searching in the galaxy wasn't going to stop him from having a stiff drink. A man hurtled out of a second story window on their left, landing on a screaming Asari. To their right, a human sat on a bench, head in hands, resigned to his fate. Kaidan spared a sideways glance at the piteous sight, taking solace in the fact that however fucked up he may be, he still didn't want to die just yet.

Things were really hitting the fan. They kept moving, racing desperately for the _Normandy_ and safety.

* * *

Jeff "Joker" Moreau sat the helm, firing up the _Normandy_'s primary systems and prepping the dock arms to release the vessel at a moment's notice. Presley paced back and forth behind him, wringing his hands nervously. "C'mon," the XO muttered desperately. "C'mon."

"They'll make it," Joker said. "They always do." Even he had no jokes for stakes such as these.

The airlock light flashed on his console. The exterior doors were opening, and the decontamination process had commenced. The lieutenant sighed with relief, looking back to his instruments to continue the preflight preparations.

"The Commanding Officer is aboard. XO Presley stands relieved," the familiar voice on the intercom said. Joker had recently named the voice Betty, for lack of anything interesting to do during a particularly slow shift on the bridge.

Shepard bolted in, followed by three familiar faces and two new ones. Wow, Joker thought to himself soberly. Kaidan really looked like a wreck. The disciplined marine was gone, and in his place stood a man who had clearly endured a lot of heartbreak. At the same time, the new Kaidan Alenko looked like a man not to be trifled with. There was a glint in his eyes, a glint that said he had taken the worst life could dish out and simply no longer gave a fuck. "Get us out of here Joker," the Commander said, gasping in air as she leaned against the bulkhead. The armor she wore wasn't light, and she had obviously doing sprinting. "And make it quick."

"Aye aye," he replied easily. "You don't need to tell me twice." He punched in the release codes and the _Normandy_ was free of the docking clamps and in his skillful hands. He eased the ship backwards out of the docking bay and turned her around, making for the orbit at full throttle. The sky was darkened by fleeing ships, desperately trying to get of Thessia before its alleged destruction.

"It's gonna get a little…close," he remarked, lurching the ship around a yacht and below a freighter. "Hang on."

* * *

"We're ready to fire," Kravar said to nobody in particular. The bridge crew worked furiously, making sure everything was perfect when the weapon was unleashed on the Asari homeworld. There was palpable tension on the bridge. The crew seemed on edge, looking half-heartedly at their instruments and consoles as the weapon fired up.

The cloaking device on the vessel would prevent any fleeing ships from detecting _Graviton_ on their sensors, and it was doubtful that any of them would get close enough to make visual contact with the sleek warship. It was a great setup. Vargan wondered how they had managed to obtain such a cloaking device, however. The famous _Normandy_, the very ship they hoped to destroy in this gambit, was the only ship he had ever heard of with such a system. He wondered distantly if he might be able to find the schematics and sell them off, but he was more interested in the display of destructive power he was about to witness. To see an entire planet destroyed…he found it positively fascinating.

Kravar seemed less intrigued, moving stiffly, as if his best friend had just died. Perhaps the man was less like the mercenary than Vargan had initially surmised. He seemed genuinely distraught at the looming attack on Thessia, and though he seemed like he would go through with it, it was clear that he would spend many a sleepless night thinking about what he had done. Kravar was a coward, Vargan decided. A spineless, gutless, coward. Little better than a human.

Alnatus looked at the viewport with almost a kind of hunger. "Do it," she commanded. "Fire."

"Fire," Kravar repeated glumly, making the order official. The human at the weapons console punched in a code, and the large turbines on either side of the _Graviton_'s hull began to spin audibly, rocking the ship with their gyrations. The weapon was building power, charging up for a blast that would kill millions.

"Twenty five percent power," the human said nervously. Whether this anxiety was fear that the weapon wouldn't fire or horror that it would, Vargan wasn't sure. The lights flickered on the bridge, momentarily startling them all.

"It's just the forcepulse charging. The demands on the ships power are astronomical. Thankfully, _Graviton_ takes all of five minutes to recover after firing. Theoretically." Alnatus told him, noticing his three-fingered hand dropping surreptitiously to his pistol.

"Interesting," Vargan replied absently, eyes never leaving the viewport.

"Fifty percent."

"We still have time to call this off, Mihra," Kravar said. "This isn't worth any reward. Even if you can't feel guilt over destroying the planet, do you really expect to get away with it? If we go through with this we're all going to be dead or imprisoned before the month is out."

Alnatus directed her piercing gaze at the Turian commander. "Vargan," she said, never breaking eye contact with Kravar. "Commander Kravar's loyalty is in question. Relieve him of duty."

Kravar froze in shock, coming to his senses after a second and reaching for his pistol. Vargan had already closed the distance, combat talon clutched in his hand. He slashed the blade across Kravar's right arm, and the pistol dropped to the deck. Another slash ripped up his chest and through his throat. The commander staggered back, left arm moving to his ruined airway as blood poured out, drenching the floor of the bridge with arterial crimson. Kravar dropped to his knees, and finally went face down on the deck.

"Excellent, Vargan." Alnatus said with a smirk. "Let that be a lesson to further dissenters. Gunnery Chief, is the weapon armed?"

"Ninety-six percent and counting. Ninety-seven. Ninety-eight. Ninety-nine. We are operational ma'am." The weapons chief looked scared of Alnatus, and positively horrified of Vargan. The Turian clacked his mandibles in amusement.

"Fire."

The weapons chief punched in a code, and two beams of not-quite-energy lashed out of the cannons on the side of the ship. It wasn't a laser, wasn't even really there. To see it, one really had to strain, but it was visible. The trademark blue shimmer of a biotic gravity distortion. The beams fired straight out at an angle, stopping on either side of Thessia, the once calm and peaceful world that would soon be gone. Two gravitational singularities opened, on opposite poles of the planet. The force they must have exerted on the planet was incredible. Thessia began to tear apart.


	9. The Ultimatum

So here we are at Chapter Nine, which, I might add, came out waaaay quicker than most chapters. Yay me, I guess. The plot has been thickening and I've been fortunate enough to dodge the fairly common silver bullet of writer's block. Anyway, this chapter is about as long as has been the norm lately, possibly a bit longer. I've recently subscribed to the Dan Brown school of thought, i.e. shorter chapters to avoid boredom and allow me to crank out updates at a steadier pace. Enough rambling, I'll let you get to reading. And hey, if you're already reading it, why not review? I do love me some feedback.

* * *

Chapter 9: The Ultimatum

_How can I blame you when it's me I can't forgive? –Metallica_

_I am the chosen next in line, sent to slaughter all mankind. - Children of Bodom_

Alenko sat in Chora's Den with three quarters of a handle of scotch, the remainder of which was now serving to ease the pain he was presently feeling. He had managed to get Hackett's permission to leave the _Normandy_ for a few hours, despite the bounty on his head. Quite frankly, he didn't really give a shit about the bounty anymore. Things were past the point where something trivial like that even mattered. Part of him _wanted_ them to capture him, so they could take him to wherever they were working from and he could kill them all. Death was better than the bastards deserved.

The mood on the Citadel was perhaps even more somber than it had been in the weeks after Sovereign's assault. They had won that battle, and despite the losses, it had been a victory to take pride in. That pride had tempered the shock at losing so many people. Thessia had been nothing but a clusterfuck of epic proportions. The home world of one of the goddamned _council races_ was gone, along with an estimated three hundred and fifty billion people. Thessia was gone. Nobody on the planet was alive. It had been torn asunder by something, something unlike anything anyone had ever seen. By the time they had recovered from the shock, whoever had caused the destruction was gone, impossible to find. This was different then the time after the Geth War. This was pure sorrow, pure mourning, mixed with outrage, fury, desire for retribution.

They had flown back to the Citadel immediately, so Garrus could give his report to the council and Shepard could be more properly briefed. She was now involved in this operation for the long haul. Fantastic, Kaidan thought to himself bitterly as he poured himself a triple-quadruple?-shot of liquor and gulped it down hungrily. It was good booze, hardly any burn. Not that it made much difference to the former marine in the state he was in. It could taste like Krogan piss for all he cared if it made him drunk enough to push such thoughts from his head.

The Citadel was almost like a tomb in the four days following the disaster. People whispered in the streets, grimaces and worried expressions on their faces. Fliers hung all over the wards, beseeching passerbies for any information about relatives who had been on Thessia, whether they made it off the surface in time, or…

"Fuck," he said aloud, passing the bottle to Joker, who had asked to tag along on Kaidan's trip into the city. The two had been polishing off the scotch for about a half hour, both thoroughly buzzed but still unable to shake thoughts of the planet's destruction.

Joker leaned back in his wheelchair, a state-of-the-art little number reserved for shore leave, when crutches simply wouldn't cut it. He gladly accepted the bottle, poured himself a shot, and downed it. "Alright," the flight lieutenant said suddenly. "The topic needs changing. I can't talk about Thessia anymore."

"I know what you mean," Kaidan replied with a grimace. Thessia had been his entire world for several days now. Even his situation with Shepard, his two year depression, and whatever the hell was going on with Kate seemed distant memories in the wake of such a tragedy. "Shit. Even my problems don't seem so big right now."

"Seems like you've been having a pretty fun time since Sovereign," Joker remarked sardonically, obviously glad for _any_ change of topic.

"Yeah, it's been a bed of fucking roses," Alenko replied, not meaning to snap at Moreau but not really wanting to deal with the man's trademark sarcasm at the moment.

Joker stroked his goatee thoughtfully. The full beard he'd had two years ago had been shaved for the award ceremony, where he'd received his Star of Terra for distinguished service in the human armed forces. Half of the crew had received stars of Terra, Kaidan among them. His was probably back in his apartment somewhere, collecting dust amid the dozens of empty bottles he had crawled into in that lonely sanctum.

"For what it's worth," Joker remarked. "Shepard's not doing too well either. Think you really sent her packing on a guilt trip, Alenko. She hardly gets any sleep nowadays. Nightmares. Virmire."

"Rough," Kaidan replied dismissively. "Until a couple weeks ago I'd been drunk every day going on two years. Want to discuss who her decision hurt more?"

"Shit," Joker replied with a whistle, impressed. "How's the liver doing?"

Kaidan took another shot and gave a weak grin. "At this point I don't really give a shit." That wasn't entirely true. His time on the mission had confirmed something that had previously been in doubt. He definitely had a pretty strong will to live, despite all of his issues. When his life was on the line, he had fought tooth and nail to preserve his own safety and take down the people threatening it. Dying of liver failure wasn't something he wanted to consider.

"Have you talked to her at all?" Moreau asked, softening. This was the Joker that few people saw, people who had been through the fires of hell with Jeff Moreau, people Jeff Moreau trusted with his life. This side of Joker was thoughtful, insightful, compassionate. The unflinching sarcasm was a shield the disabled pilot wore most of the time, but when things got to the point, he was one of the best friends Alenko had had.

"No," Alenko replied. "We argued before she arrived, and we definitely didn't have time to argue when we were getting out of there. Since Thessia…well, everyone's been busy. So no."

"You might want to think about it. Look, Alenko. I'm not a philosopher, I'm not a therapist. I don't know who's at fault here, or even if anybody is at fault. But I think deep down, Shepard still loves you. Whether you can ever forgive her is your business, but I think you owe it to her to have a civil discussion about what happened, try to come to some kind of understanding about it."

It was good advice, he thought to himself. Shepard had never directly harmed him, had never performed a single act with the intention of hurting him. She had hurt him anyway, perhaps irreparably so, but that still didn't mean she had deserved to be treated the way he had treated her. He didn't bother mentioning that Shepard had started their last argument, had flipped her shit the second she found out he was present. Whether or not the commander even wanted to open up some reasonable dialogue was open for debate.

"It was a hard decision for her, Alenko. It was probably a bit like choosing between a husband and a sister. They were close, Shepard and Ash. Not as close as you two were, but hey, you're sitting here right now, two years after Virmire. Ashley isn't so lucky."

"I guess what I'm trying to tell you is that Shep didn't go back for you saying to herself, 'this'll totally fuck Kaidan's life forever.' She wanted to save you because she loved you. Didn't want to live without you."

"How the hell do you know all this?" Kaidan asked, suddenly suspicious.

"I've been working a lot of night shifts," Joker replied with a shrug. "Gets awfully lonely on the bridge at one in the morning, with only Betty keeping you company. Luckily, the commander can hardly ever sleep through the night, so we've had some good chats. I guess I'm sort of her confidante at this point."

"Huh," the former marine remarked. "Good to know. She told you all that stuff?"

Moreau nodded, taking another shot of the scotch. "That's good shit," he said amicably. "One or two more and I'm going to be done with this conversation as we know it," he warned. "But yeah. She told me all that stuff."

Alenko was pretty sure that Shepard and he were completely finished in the romantic sense. He simply couldn't see anything like that rekindling under even the strangest of circumstances. But, he decided. At least they could graduate to civil terms. The more he thought about the situation, the less blame he was able to point at Rebecca. She'd had to make a choice that was going to have very unpleasant ramifications no matter how she played it.

In truth, he was not interested in ever getting back with Shepard, even assuming they could bury the hatchet, or even remake their past friendship. Sometimes, there is no going back in life. Sometimes things cannot be the way they were. Life is a fickle bitch, and she gives no second chances. And there was a certain doctor who seemed to have her eye on him, he thought to himself. It made him feel a little better, despite his inherent confusion about that particular incident. It definitely seemed rather odd. He hadn't known her for long at all, and she had been acting as his therapist. It just seemed like a strange turn of events. He wondered if she really felt anything for him in that sense or if it was some sort of defense mechanism she employed subconsciously in response to the destruction of the _Alexander._ Kaidan had no idea, but he probably wasn't in any shape to begin a relationship of any kind anyway. His life was still in tatters, and while he was just beginning to emerge from his shell of pain, he wasn't over it. Not by a long shot. He made up his mind to tell her that he simply couldn't be involved, the next time he saw her. It wasn't anything personal; it was just where he was in his life.

"Enough of this soul searching," he said suddenly, pouring more of the stiff liquor. "I'm not leaving this bar until I'm too drunk to walk."

"I always did like the way you thought," Joker replied with a wide grin, raising his glass.

* * *

Garrus sat in the war room with the most important people in the government and military, discussing the occurrences on Thessia for what seemed like the millionth time, all the while trying to ascertain some kind of clue as to where to go from there. The op on the asari homeworld hadn't been a shining point in the Spectre's career. He hadn't managed to obtain any pertinent information at all. They still didn't know who they were up against, what they were after, where they were going, _anything_.

He adjusted uncomfortably in his chair, which did not accommodate his sizable frame. The Turian councilor and the leader of the Turian military, a man named Grannus, seemed to be faring similarly. Also in the small chamber near the top of the Citadel Tower were the remaining councilor; the suspicious Salarian, the levelheaded Asari, and the venerable David Anderson, recently appointed human councilor. Rounding out the group were other top brass military officers, including Stephen Hackett, an Asari commander, and a Salarian colonel involved in their espionage program. This left Rebecca Shepard, the finest soldier Garrus had ever known.

"So the head of Hamalah Security was involved…" the Asari councilor mused, still unsettled by this fact after days of discussing what had happened. She lacked the poise she normally demonstrated, appearing to Garrus a woman defeated. The mood was prevalent among the Asari people, and most other people. The councilor was shellshocked, still struggling to process what had happened four days ago. Garrus had seen it first hand and could still hardly believe it himself.

Mihra Alnatus and her allies would pay in blood, Garrus resolved silently. He would see to it personally. He recalled a discussion he had with Commander Shepard, back when they were still hunting Saren. He'd asked her if it was really wise to bring the rogue Spectre back to the Citadel, fearing that the Turian would be able to weasel his way out of his punishment. No, Shepard had assured him, Saren would not survive their encounter. Garrus felt similarly about Mihra Alnatus.

"We should have detected the aggressors," Hackett said, thinking aloud. "How did they take out an entire planet and get away without so much as a blip on our sensors?"

Garrus considered it. He was still baffled by the whole thing. The fact was, he _didn't_ know how Alnatus and her people had managed to get away unscathed. He imagined that the overwhelming confusion and panic that had overtaken all of the escaping vessels had something to do with it, but _somebody_ should have seen _something_. It just didn't make sense.

Shepard traced a finger down the scar on her cheek, a sure sign that she was deep in thought. What had occurred to her that hadn't occurred to the rest of them? "Wait just a goddamned minute!" she exclaimed suddenly. It was her first pertinent statement during their sessions. Shepard had been…distant, since he'd been reunited with her. Alenko was obviously weighing heavily on her mind. She'd been silent, withdrawn, her face a mask of conflicting emotions. The Turian didn't understand the situation entirely, but he sensed that it was an unpleasant one, and that their shared ordeals on the tropical hell of Virmire were at the root of it.

"What is it commander?" Anderson asked, trusting completely in the woman who had been something like his pupil, back in the day. There had always been a connection between those two. A kind of understanding that stretched beyond a captain and his executive officer. They were on the same page, those two.

"Alnatus has a cloaking device. It's the only way. The _only_ way," she said, brushing a lock of red hair out of her face. "We would have gotten something on the sensors. We swept the whole system."

"Impossible," the Turian councilor scoffed. He was a professional scoffer, Garrus had learned from his dealings with the man. There was no pleasing him, short of blowing a giant sentient doomsday machine straight to hell and saving the galaxy in the process.

Hackett nodded. "It was so simple we didn't think of it. It was only a matter of time before someone emulated our technology. The commander is correct, councilor. I'd wager a great deal on it. Think about it logically. _Normandy's_ been around for two years in the public eye, and we already know that our opponents don't fuck around technologically. Just take a look at Thessia. If they could do that, a cloak doesn't seem like a stretch."

"I agree," the Salarian spymaster remarked. "It's simple diffusion. No technology remains exclusive indefinitely."

Anderson nodded, eyes widening as he considered the ramifications of such diffusion. "They never left the system," he said bleakly. "They just waited it out, probably tucked behind some asteroid, and waited for things to clear up. People left. Headed here. You can't jump to FTL speeds and maintain the heat sink to stay cloaked. They waited it out, and jumped when the coast was clear. Those sons of bitches were right under our noses, probably for at least twelve hours."

The Asari councilor put her hands over her face, shuddering with a wracking sob. They waited patiently as she regained her composure. "My apologies," she said shakily. "This is…difficult."

"Alright," Hackett said gravely. "We've figured out how they escaped our notice. Now we need to decide what we're going to do about it. I'll be damned if these people are going to get away with this. I'm going to see them punished for this."

"Agreed," Garrus chimed in. "They don't get to walk away. Not after this."

The intercom device at the center of the table they sat around beeped, and Anderson patched the transmission through. "Anderson here. What is it?"

"Councilor," the Salarian voice on the other end began. "We're receiving a transmission, sir. We believe it's from Alnatus. We need some time to trace it, though."

"Shit," Anderson swore, betraying his perfect composure and his station as incorruptible councilor. "Put it through."

"Of course," the Salarian replied.

A new voice came on the speakers. Female, sultry. But also cold, pitiless; there was no compassion in this new voice, and it was a voice both Garrus and Shepard were familiar with.

"This is Mihra Alnatus. Am I speaking to the Council? Or do you imbeciles continue to waste my time?"

"This is Councilor Anderson," the man said after he swallowed his initial shock. "What do you want?" he asked pointedly. It was odd, how quickly he had become the defacto leader of the council through his commanding presence and poise. Garrus supported Anderson completely.

"What did you think of our little display?" the voice asked leeringly. "Consider it a warning. If our demands are not met, Thessia was just the beginning. We'll do the same to Palaven, Earth, and anywhere else we decide. My employer doesn't wish to negotiate with you. We're going to lay down an ultimatum, and you have one week to comply. We want your fleets decommissioned. We want the Citadel Tower abandoned. We want your docking bays cleared. We want your militaries disbanded."

"You're out of your mind," Anderson replied. "What could you possibly gain from that?"

"We're staging a coup, Councilor. We tire of your leadership, and think the galaxy would be a better place if it was under our control. We're taking over, Anderson. We've developed the most devastating weapon in the history of the Galaxy, Anderson. What other goal is fitting for its power?

We don't feel any great compulsion to wipe out another planet, but we've no qualms about it. We're taking control of things, Anderson, because might makes right, and nobody has what we have."

"Please," Anderson said, broken. "There must be something…anything. We've got money. Lots of money. Trillions of credits, all yours. Please."

"Begging now, are we? The great David Anderson, groveling before me? Keep groveling, David. I like to hear it."

"Please. Please. I beg you."

This was very uncharacteristic of the captain. What the hell was he doing? This wasn't the David Anderson they knew, and the situation was made as uncomfortable by his behavior as it was by the threat before them.

"I would do anything to change your mind. Anything you want. Name it."

"Will you grovel at my feet?"

"I'll grovel at your feet."

"It's not enough, David. One week." She cut out, leaving them with nothing.

Anderson immediately straightened, patching through to the Salarian from before. "Did you get a trace on her?"

"Of course, Councilor. They're on a planet called Mernea."

"Good," the man replied with grim satisfaction. "I had to stall her, keep her on the line. Our tech guys needed time to get a fix on her location. We know where they are."

The room erupted in cheers, Hackett clapping the councilor heartily on the back. "Shepard," the admiral said somberly. "Get your crew together. I want you to bring Garrus, Wrex, and Alenko, as well. You'll need the best strike team you can get, and I want you ready to leave within eight hours. In the meantime, we're going to find out what we can about what you're up against on Mernea. The fate of the galaxy is on your shoulders again. Do us proud."


	10. Discussions and Coup D'etats

A big hello to all! Sorry for the prerequisite enormous delay between chapters, but when writer's block hits me it isn't a pretty thing. This is probably not one of my better chapters, because I kind of wrote myself into a corner a bit. I handled it better than I usually do, at least; I've been writing on and off for years, and usually when I inevitably write myself into a corner I just trash the story and move onto greener pastures. Since this is the first story I've written that has ever actually been read by anyone but me, I thought extra hard about how to climb out of the hole I dug myself. Anyway, I'm loathe to get specific about what i was really stumped on because that will only highlight the contrived nature of my fix for it. Or maybe I'm overly critical of myself. Anyway, most of it is fine, so enjoy!

_You can go your own way.- Fleetwood Mac_

_Like a tall-standing table where resentments run free, there can't be any truth when there's no honesty.- Dropkick Murphys_

Chapter 10: Discussions and Coup D'états

Kaidan's buzz had been all but destroyed after he was filled in on the goings-on in the Council's war room. Their adversary's plot was almost laughably diabolical, the kind of shit you'd see in a trashy novel or a B-movie. It took one hell of a weapon to make such an ultimatum even feasible. It was still a stretch for them to get the Citadel to disarm all of its military, but having what essentially boiled down to the Death Star of ancient fiction handy was a big step in that direction.

He'd still been with Joker, hardly even really drunk (his tolerance was obscene after the amount of hard drinking he'd put his body through), when two gruff looking military types had entered Chora's Den and told them to report back to the _Normandy_ immediately. A few weeks ago Alenko would have told them to fuck off, but things had changed. These people had destroyed an entire planet. They'd tried to abduct him, and they'd tried to kill him. As far as he was concerned, this was his problem now. Kaidan Alenko was ready to kick some ass.

He was presently in the C-Sec quartermaster's office, preparing for war. The Turian at the desk was an accommodating fellow whom Kaidan had met during the last war, the one that had had a defined enemy and a concrete goal. The Canadian helped himself to cutting edge equipment, free of charge, all in the name of galactic salvation. He checked the clip of the Razer pistol he'd selected. Kassa Fabrications was traditionally an armor manufacturer, but their new line of handguns was impressive. Satisfied, he attached it to the hardpoint of his shiny new Colossus armor. It was almost obscene how well-made the armor was, with shield strength to rival the _Destiny Ascension_.

Even so, he'd never been entirely comfortable in hardsuits; they hampered his mobility even at their lightest. Nor was he a fan of rifles of any kind, preferring to keep a hand free to toss people around biotically. He had once been an excellent shot with a pistol, though he was out of practice. He'd acquired some Diazepam to quell the DT shakes he'd been experiencing in his time away from hard liquor. For better or worse, Kaidan Alenko felt like a soldier again.

This was all in addition to his new biotic amplifier, which promised to almost double the output he'd had with the old one, which was apparently a relic in the ever changing world of military technology. He'd had a good amp before, but it wasn't even in the same league as his new one.

"Thanks," he told the officer, starting out of the office. He was surprised to see Kate Winters standing at the top of the stairs, sad smile on her face.

"They told me you'd be here," she said, brushing a stray lock of hair from her face. "I wanted to talk to you before you left."

He stared blankly for a moment, until it occurred to him that there was no reason for her to be present on the mission. The _Normandy_ had a fully manned sickbay; Hanley and Kate were done with this affair. "Oh. Yeah, of course," he replied, shifting uncomfortably in his combat armor.

"I wanted to talk about what happened the other night," she said, voice still serious.

"A lot happened, but I think I know what you mean," he replied."I actually wanted to talk about that."

"I'm sorry, Kaidan. I don't know why I did it. It was unprofessional, inappropriate, and cruel." Ah, so that was where this was going. It was difficult for him to feel hurt by what he knew was coming next, for he'd been planning to do the same to her. She merely beat him to the proverbial punch.

"I was under duress. A lot of my friends died on the _Alexander_, and you were…you were great. You put your own problems aside to make me feel better. You helped to make me feel safe when I needed it the most. I guess that's what brought on…you know."

"Don't worry about it, Kate. Truth be told, that was what I wanted to talk about. Fact is, I'm not really on the market right now. I'm staying single for a while, for all the obvious reasons. I was going to tell you that I couldn't reciprocate whatever you might be feeling, but you had the same thing in mind."

"Really?" she asked, seeming to perk up a bit with the news. "I was afraid I'd upset you, but I had to speak my piece. I'm sorry anyway."

"Don't worry about it," he repeated, feeling awkward. "Well, Kate. I should get going. Looks like we're in for some chop," he said with a smile, quoting _Aliens_ again.

She smiled. "Bye, Kaidan. Take care of yourself," she said softly. He'd known this conversation was coming, but why did it have to be so goddamned awkward?

Unsure how to make his exit, the former marine stuck out a gloved hand. She grasped it firmly. _A handshake, huh? You're a real lady-killer,_ he chided himself. "Thanks. You too."

And with that, Kaidan left Kate Winters on the stairs of the C-Sec quartermaster's office. Oddly, it seemed that a weight had been lifted from him, as if his entire life had become just a little simpler. He walked to the docking bay elevator with a spring that had long been absent from his step. It was time to bring these fuckers down, whoever they were.

* * *

Vargan was thoroughly impressed by the whole operation. He'd been on Mernea for two days, and everything about the organization was professional, calculating, and utterly ruthless. The compound was home to a small legion of mercenaries from all walks of life. The basic grunts were marauders, pirates, scum who did what they did because they were too stupid to do anything else. The group was run more like a military operation than a typical crime syndicate, with assigned ranks and structure. Vargan had been made an officer, a captain. The officers were a cut above the grunts, most of them coming from elite military backgrounds.

These officers answered directly to Alnatus. She was a very fascinating woman, the Turian decided. Beautiful, intelligent, cruel, and cunning, she was very fascinating indeed. He hadn't seen much of her since he'd arrived at the compound, an impressive underground facility. It was a large place, and much of it was restricted from all but Alnatus, the mysterious head of the organization, and the lauded science team, relics of a defunct human corporation and the designers of the astonishing destruction he'd witnessed at Thessia.

His duties on the base were minimal; Vargan got the impression that his position in the syndicate was different than that of his fellow officers. He'd been given next to nothing to do, even as his colleagues oversaw duty shifts, kept the thugs in line, and made lengthy written reports to Alnatus. Vargan suspected that Alnatus recognized his considerable talents and kept him around as an insurance policy. He was fine with being a hitman; it actually suited him.

Today he'd not even left his quarters. He sat in a spartan little chair and perused the Citadel's extranet stories, cleverly encrypted and masked to keep Mernea off of the radar. The majority of the stories were dedicated to the destruction of Thessia. He glossed over them quickly. Finally, an article caught his eye. _Kaidan Alenko's Death a Fallacy_, it read. The persistent little prick had been sighting knocking back shots in Chora's Den yesterday. So the _Normandy _had indeed escaped. The massive traffic fleeing Thessia had prevented _Graviton_ from getting an accurate sensor feed on the Alliance's flagship. Now they knew. Shepard, Alenko, Vakarian, and goddamned Wrex were still alive, still problems.

Vargan immediately decided against telling his new employers, assuming they weren't already aware. The Turian was not a trusting man, and his own interests came before Mihra Alnatus'. He chose to maintain the upper hand, hanging onto any information that could bring him an advantage if tensions were to arise down the road. Hell, maybe if the chips fell right, he could take over the entire outfit. His mandibles clacked in amusement as he imagined the power of the _Graviton_ at his slender fingertips.

A knock at his door snapped him back to the now. He approached the threshold with his pistol in his right hand. He opened the door and peeked outside, making himself visible while keeping the weapon concealed. One could never be too careful. "Ah," he said. "Mihra. Come in."

The beautiful Asari stepped into his quarters with a frown on her delicate features. "We're on first name basis now?"

"Yes, I think so," he replied airily. "What can I do for you?"

"You're going to meet the boss," she replied, gesturing at the door. He nodded, reattaching the handgun to his armor.

Fifteen minutes later, they arrived at the base's main elevator. Alnatus hit the call switch and the Turian spoke. "Alenko isn't dead," he said, deciding that the it was more than likely she would find out and desiring something to talk about. "That means Wrex is alive as well. Do you think we have enough men on this base?"

"Of course," she replied dismissively. "He's one man."

"I fought him. Alenko is nothing. The Krogan is unstoppable," he said, stepping into the lift that had arrived.

"You worry too much. He's dangerous, yes. But so is any weapon, in the proper hands. He's aimed at us for the moment, by the real threat. We need not fear a weapon; only the people using it." The elevator doors opened and they stepped out. "Welcome to our R&D department, Vargan. Do you remember what we discussed last night?" He gave a short nod, not wishing to speak of it.

Men, mostly human, hunched around computers, making constant adjustments, as five older men paced about the room, overseeing the process. One of them, a bald human, approached. "Mihra," he said in a strange accent the humans described as Russian. "We're making the final adjustments to the next batch. Things should be in order within a day or two."

"Good, Dr. Kasparov. I'm here to speak to our superior."

"Ah, yes," the doctor replied knowingly. "I'll buzz you in. Good luck."

They followed the man over to a retinal scanner, which he hunched over. A door beside the device slid open as the scanner confirmed his identity.

They stepped into the room, which was a finely furnished office in human style, complete with wood paneling and bookshelves. A liquor cabinet sat on one side of the room. The man at the desk was unassuming, less imposing than Vargan had expected.

"Mr. Vargan," the man greeted him casually. "Please, have a seat. My name is-" The Turian cut him off with a gunshot. The shot took the man in the shoulder. "Mihra," he gasped through gritted teeth. "What is….the…meaning of this?!"

"Consider it a hostile takeover," Alnatus said smugly. "You heard about Thessia, yes? It was my doing. The joke's been on you, all this time, you _fool!_ Did you truly believe that this was for your damned mining? No, Jerry. You were just our financier, our means of making all of this happen. Why in the hell would planet-shearing gravity wells be used for _mining?_ Know this, Faraday. Your death marks my ascension. Thanks to your stupidity, and your funding, the galaxy will answer to Mihra Alnatus. Kill him, Vargan."

The Turian slowly walked around the desk, holstering his pistol. He drew his combat talon casually, savoring the moment. Tears streaked the man's face, tears of pain from his wound, horror at what had just been revealed to him, and the terror that accompanied impending death. The Turian sprang into rapid, lethal motion, plunging the knife into the man's chest and jerking it around for good measure. He pulled the deadly blade free, wiped it clean on the man's shirt, and put it back in its holster.

"Gerald Faraday was a man of limited vision. He saw the technology solely as a means of financial gain. He was thinking small. Now that we have the weapon operational, we no longer need his services. Thank you, Vargan."

"It was my pleasure." They exited the room to cheers from the science team. The final piece clicked into place. Vargan clacked his mandibles in distinct amusement. He'd fit right in here.

* * *

Kaidan had feared that the _Normandy _would be foreign and strange to him upon his return to it. Now, here he was, back in his old hangout, as the final launch preparations were being made. Back by the console he'd used to work at during his tenure on the _Normandy_. He leaned against the wall, displeased with the situation. The briefing would be going down in a little bit, and he would be expected there. This put him in close proximity with his favorite commander.

A young guy worked at the console, which still glowed with the same orange intensity it always had. Somebody had to keep the damned thing working.

"Porter," a familiar voice said, jarring him from his thoughts. "Take a break." Rebecca Shepard walked towards Kaidan and the young navy man. He flashed back to the Geth War, and the many times she'd walked up to him in just such a way, sweat glistening on her forehead in the harsh light that the ever-malfunctioning console threw out.

"Aye, ma'am," the kid said a little too quickly, beating a hasty departure. Kaidan surmised that the…situation between him and the commander was not entirely confidential. The _Normandy_ had always had a perceptive, close-knit crew, so he wasn't particularly surprised. Not to mention that Joker had a mouth like a sieve.

She stood there, as she had so many times before, looking totally unchanged. Beautiful as ever; not even the scar on her face could detract from that. Her eyes were steely, and she seemed tense. _I wonder why,_ he thought to himself sarcastically.

"We need to talk," she said simply, her voice weary. "Now, before Hackett calls the briefing and things are awkward for everyone present."

Kaidan swallowed hard. This was it. The moment he'd been dreading. "I agree," he replied lamely, hoping it would prompt her to lead the discussion.

She cocked her head to the side, as if she expected more from him.

"Goddammit," he said suddenly. "I don't know how to talk about this."

"That makes two of us," she replied. They were being surprisingly civil, melancholy rather than volatile.

"For a while after…you know, after Ashley died, I thought I was fine. I was _happy_, for once in my life. After a while, I started to have the dreams. Nightmares, really. Ashley, blaming me for what happened to her. Accusing me. I started drinking. You know the rest."

"No, damn it, I _don't!_" she said, voice rising. "_I don't fucking know!_ You never spoke to me, never called me to tell me you were hurting. I come home and you explode at me, and I never see you in person again! What the fuck did I do to deserve that? What _the FUCK_ did I _EVER_ fucking do to you to make you do that to me?" He could see that she was crying, and wasn't sure why it bothered him so much.

She took a deep breath, obviously trying to calm herself down. "I_ loved you,_ Kaidan. With all my heart. You were what kept me going on that assignment I was on while your life was going to hell. Your picture was the last thing I saw at night and the first thing I saw at 0500 hours, every morning. When I came home…it hurt. It hurt so damned bad." She sobbed, shaking her entire body.

"I don't expect you to forgive me," he replied earnestly. The words just seemed to come to him unbidden. "I've been doing a lot of thinking. I wronged you, Comma-Rebecca. I did. It was probably the shittiest thing I've ever done. Even considering the state I was in, I should have shown you the compassion that you always showed me. You asked what you did to deserve it. The answer? Fucking nothing. Not a goddamned thing. I've been going over what happened on Virmire more critically over the past few weeks, and you did the same goddamned thing I would have done. I would have saved you, no matter the cost. I don't have any excuses for what I did. I'm sorry. Truly sorry."

She sighed, tears streaking her cheeks. "I still listen to Rush, you know," she said, referring to his dad's favorite band, the Canadian progressive rock outfit he'd been listening to on the _Alexander_. He'd introduced them to her and she'd really taken to them.

He felt the corners of his mouth rising in a faint smile. "They were the best," he replied, glad to have a change of topic.

Joker's voice echoed over the loudspeakers, snapping them back to reality. "Admiral Hackett requests Commander Shepard, Urdnot Wrex, Garrus Vakarian, and Kaidan Alenko in the comm room."

"That's us," Kaidan said humorlessly. The former lovers started up the winding stairs to their briefing, neither hating the other quite as much as they had just a couple of days ago.


	11. If You Want Peace

Wow, look at that! I burned the midnight oil a few nights in a row and here it is, a new chapter a scant few days after the last one. Well, there's not much I can say to preface this chapter, considering that I just wrote such a preface a few days ago. So, without further ado, here's chapter 11!

Chapter 11: If You Want Peace…

_  
The bullets scream to me from somewhere. -Alice In Chains_

_I still haven't found what I'm looking for. -U2_

_

* * *

_

"Welcome," Hackett began as Kaidan sat down in his old chair, an uncomfortable thing typical of a military vessel. It was almost like the old days, sitting here in the comm room with much of the old crew. Granted, neither Tali nor Liara were involved in this gigantic clusterfuck of a situation, and Ashley was…Kaidan fought the thoughts off. He'd spent too much of his life going over what happened to Ashley Williams. He had to focus on the now, on the things that he could change. Right now, some very bad people threatened to destroy the balance of galactic power, and it was within his influence to change this outcome, kill these bad people, and put things right.

He realized with a start that he was, despite all that had happened, doing a lot better than he'd been doing for a long time. The talk with Shepard hadn't been as nightmarish as he'd always imagined it would be, his alcoholism was in check for the moment, he hadn't touched any pills barring the diazepam he was using to shoot straight, and he was actually able to set thoughts of Ashley aside to focus on the present. He smiled to himself faintly. Maybe there was hope for him yet.

Garrus stepped into the room and sat down next to Wrex, who surveyed the comm room with his usual detachment, seeming almost bored. Kaidan knew better. Wrex didn't miss a trick, despite his demeanor.

Shepard's face was still red from crying, though she'd wiped her face and steeled her expression. She'd always been a strong woman; when it was time to go to work, she was cool, appraising, and efficient. She sat in the chair, her face a mask of determination that belied what she was most surely thinking about: their talk downstairs.

Hackett, who was standing in the center of the room, finally spoke. "Welcome, everyone. You all know why you're here. You're here because you're the best, and we need the best. The _Normandy_'s ground crew from the war; the stuff of legend, back together for one last shindig on the eve of Armageddon. A Salarian espionage vessel was in range of Mernea, close enough to get a reading on it with their long-range sensors. It's something of a rarity among planets; it's a completely habitable world with no colonization."

"Why is that?" Garrus asked pointedly. Kaidan resisted a chuckle. He liked the Turian, he really did, but Garrus was so damned predictable. He was a good soldier; hell, he was a great soldier, but he had always been a bit too eager for Kaidan's tastes. Hackett was obviously going to explain why the planet hadn't been colonized, but the Turian's hungry desire to impress his superiors led him to ask questions, to try and appear on the ball. Sometimes being on the ball didn't earn you any kudos; sometimes it was just annoying.

"It's on the border with the Terminus systems, three days out from any mass relays. Essentially, it's cut off. If we were to colonize, our people would essentially be at the mercy of the slavers and pirates. It's unfortunate, because it really is quite a beautiful place." The admiral typed something into the console on the viewport, bringing up a very surprising image of the planet.

"It's a jungle," Shepard observed with some interest. It was. The majority of Mernea's continental surface was a lush jungle, dotted with lakes and rivers, with the occasional snow capped mountain range. What a rarity, Kaidan thought to himself. The conditions had to be perfect to facilitate such vitality on a celestial body; if it was too far away from the star, it would be a frigid wasteland, too cold to accommodate life. Conversely, if it was too close, furious heat would assail its surface. The planets conditions were arguably superior to even that of Earth's; it looked to maintain a constant across its surface; the tropical climes seemed to cover the entire world. It was really quite beautiful, the kind of place people would pay thousands of credits to vacation at. Kaidan suspected that his trip to Mernea would be a bit more stressful.

"Indeed, Commander. Which begs the question; what exactly are we looking for?" Hackett said rhetorically. "The Salarians did some investigating, trying to determine where the signal came from. They traced it….here," Hackett said, pausing as he zoomed the view to a patch of deep rainforest on the westernmost continent. "There's something big, below the surface here. Salarian sensors picked up all kinds of energy being generated down there, stuff that one really wouldn't expect to find in a rainforest. Particularly Element Zero."

He let them digest the information. Kaidan considered the known factors. Things were starting to make sense, in a roundabout way that didn't make a whole hell of a lot of sense. The bastards from Conatix, the ones responsible for all the shit he'd been put through as a kid, were experts in the field of Element Zero research. Their research had made the devastation on Thessia possible, and it was going to possibly bring about the destruction of more worlds. Where L2s like himself factored into this was still a mystery, but he'd pieced together a decent enough knowledge base to decide that these scientists had to be put down with impunity.

"So we nuke them," Shepard said with a shrug of her shoulders. "They're underground; a tactical nuclear strike would cripple their whole operation. Seems simple enough."

"We believe it likely that they have hostages," Hackett replied, dismissing the suggestion. "The L2 abductions have been extensive; upwards of two hundred people have just vanished. We need to operate under the assumption that they're in there and that they're alive. That's reason A. It's something to consider, but reason B is a bit more compelling. Some of our people crunched the numbers and did a little research; a nuclear detonation in the vicinity of such a high concentration of Eezo is going to wipe out a lot more than the facility. It's going to wipe out the entire planet, and most of the system. Unless we want this to be a kamikaze run, this is going to be done the old fashioned way. In the trenches."

"Good," Wrex rumbled. The Krogan was always up for a good fight, always ready to bring the battle to the enemy in as personal a manner as possible.

"It's not that simple," Shepard replied. "We're running blind here. We can't very well land on the planet and expect to find the entrance to the facility. There's got to be something to go on, or we're going to run out of time." She was right. The Eezo energy signatures gave them a vague area to work with, but the jungle was vast and the entrance would be difficult to find without more intel. Considering that they were on a time frame and that Mernea wasn't near a mass relay, a full scale search of the planet was out of the question.

"You didn't let me finish, Commander. They did some more scrounging, and they came across what seems to be the facility's ventilation system. Energy emissions are strongest…right here," Hackett said, zooming in on a large rock formation that seemed to be about a mile in diameter. "It seems that there might be a way in somewhere on that cliff, perhaps a cave or something similar. It's a poor lead, but we know they're there and we know that's at least in the ballpark, and we don't have much else to go on."

"Parameters, sir?" Shepard was asking Hackett how he wanted this handled. How far he wanted them to take Thessia's retribution.

Hackett cracked his knuckles. "We'd like whoever's in charge alive, as well as the Asari, if it's at all possible. I can assure you that the things the legal system will do to these people will be a fate far worse than anything you can dole out on the spot. We'll understand if it ends up being impossible. Things could get complicated down there. Other than that, try and save the biotics if you can. Anything else is up to you."

Good, Kaidan thought to himself. Their hands were free to handle the situation at their own discretion. Their main objective was a simple one. Stop these people from destroying another world, at any cost.

* * *

Kaidan awoke with a start, banged his head on the window of the sleeper pod. He muttered a curse and opened the pod's door, climbing out and stretching. The goddamn dream again. It was always the goddamn dream. He expected that the next good sleep he would get would be the sleep of death, if the last two years were anything to gauge it by. The dream had become a constant in his life, but that didn't make it any more pleasant. He adjusted the fabric of the crewman's uniform he'd reluctantly agreed to wear, bending down to put his boots on and lace them up. There would be no more sleep tonight, not without a bottle of Jack to calm him down. Sadly, Mr. Daniels wasn't around at the moment.

He looked at his watch. It was 4:30 in the morning, earth-time. He'd long ago opted against the standard Citadel day; the station never slept anyway; why should he alter decades of his established routine to follow a completely arbitrary system?

4:30…that meant that they should be coming up on the second mass relay within a couple of hours. The first jump had been from the relay near the Citadel. The next jump would take them to their last destination. After that, they would travel at normal speeds to reach Mernea in approximately three days. His stellar navigation was a bit rusty; so he didn't know all of the specifics, but he had enough to go by.

He walked down the catwalk, taking in the familiar sights, the atmosphere of the _Normandy_. She was a fine ship, even two years after her shakedown. None of the usual obsolescence had set in during those years. She was lean, fast, powerful, and the stealth system was still ahead of the pack.

He walked by the mess table, past the glowing orange console. He took a long look at the door to Shepard's quarters. He didn't hate her anymore. He wasn't really sure _how_ he felt. He was aware of an acute, stinging guilt at the way he had treated her. Where did he go wrong in life? What the hell had happened to him? He thought of the man he used to be. The kid he used to be. In love with Rahna, unsure how to act on it. Tossing that Turian twenty feet through the air. The _guilt_ he'd felt afterwards. Such guilt! When he killed now, he felt nothing. He'd killed a lot of people on Thessia and he didn't feel any remorse for it at all! The fact that he felt no remorse paradoxically made him remorseful. He'd become a cynical shell of a man, incapable of taking down his armor for even a second. Granted, old Kaidan Alenko had been possessed of a certain naiveté, but new Kaidan Alenko was an asshole. He'd wronged that woman. He'd wronged Rebecca Shepard.

He moved on, coming to the stairwell. He decided against heading for the bridge, instead hitting the call switch on the elevator. He stepped into the lift and ran a hand pensively through his hair. He needed to take some time away from everything after this, to get away from everyone and everything that defined him as himself. He needed to sort this out, these myriad feelings that floated around inside him unbidden. He needed to, as ridiculous as it sounded even in his thoughts, find himself, put himself back together.

He stepped off the lift in the cargo bay to see Wrex leaning against the wall to his left, right where the Krogan always stood. "Alenko," the Krogan grunted in greeting. "Hell of a mess we've gotten ourselves into this time."

"Yeah," the Canadian replied. "It's a bad situation. As bad as Saren was, he never achieved any kind of destruction like we saw on Thessia. This is going to be a tough fight."

"That's the best kind," Wrex replied. "I hope that there are lots of mercenaries on Mernea. I'd hate to think that I've already seen my life's best battle." Only Wrex would describe charging up the side of the Citadel Tower in a vacuum while plowing through an army of Geth as the "best" anything, but Kaidan digressed.

"I suspect that we'll have our hands full. Alnatus is down there. The Asari bitch from Hamalah. We've got unfinished business with her."

"It'll be a good time," Wrex said in conclusion. "Did you talk to Shepard?"

"Yeah. We talked. Things are still a little uncertain, but I don't think there'll be problems during the mission."

"Williams was a good warrior, Alenko," Wrex said unexpectedly. "She died a warrior's death. You humans have some fascinating mythology. A lot of it has parallels to Krogan legend. Some of you used to believe that if a warrior died in battle, he'd be taken to a paradise, a final resting place fit only for people such as himself. Williams is in Valhalla, Alenko. Honor her. Don't dwell on it."

Kaidan fought his surprise and found himself surprisingly touched by the Krogan's sentiment. It was rare to see anything like that from Wrex, so Kaidan felt sure that the big alien meant every word of it. "Thanks, Wrex."

"I wasn't trying to make you feel better, Alenko. To wish that a soldier had died under different circumstances or hadn't died at all is insulting. When I die, I want people to drink to my name and honor me. Don't minimize what Williams accomplished on Virmire by mourning her."

It made sense, in a Krogan sort of way. Alenko still appreciated the gesture, he decided, despite Wrex viewing mourning as complete taboo.

"I'll try, Wrex. Has anyone mentioned the strike team to you? I haven't heard anything. Are the new guys coming with us?" He was referring to Shepard's ground team on Hamalah, the biotic whose name he had never learned, and Rico, the woman who'd been hacking away on her omni-tool.

"I hope not. I fight better alone or in a small group. The four of us can take anything these mercs can throw at us, if the grunts on Thessia were the norm."

Kaidan disagreed but didn't voice his opinion. The more people on the ground, the better. While Shepard, Garrus, Wrex, and himself had probably seen more action than any four people in Citadel space, having extra guns around wouldn't hurt. It didn't help that they knew jack shit about what they were up against.

A great tiredness suddenly overtook him. Maybe he'd actually be able to get another couple of hours in. Since he wasn't technically a marine or a member of the _Normandy_'s crew, he wasn't obligated to fulfill any duties until the ground op began, so he could even sleep in if the mood struck him. There were always a few extra sleeper pods onboard, ones that would remain empty no matter who was on duty.

He yawned. "I think I'm going to head out, Wrex," he said.

"So long, Alenko," the Krogan said, crossing his arms across his chest. Kaidan turned and stepped back into the elevator, hitting the switch and sighing as it began its lengthy ascension. The lift finally arrived on the main deck and he stepped out.

"Hi," a voice said to his right. He turned to see Shepard standing at the door to her quarters, looking tired. Her hair was a mess and she wasn't wearing makeup, but she still pulled off astounding beauty with typical ease. "Couldn't sleep?" She seemed calm, almost serene. There was no antagonism in her voice; she seemed genuinely curious.

"Nope. Never can," he replied, carefully dodging the obvious pitfall of seeming to blame her for this. "You?"

"Let's sit down," she said in response. They moved into the mess. She pulled out a chair and lowered her slim frame down into it. He sat down across the table from her. "I've become a bit of an insomniac," she confessed. "Probably for some of the same reasons you can't sleep."

"Ashley?" he asked simply, not wishing to press the issue too hard.

"Ashley. Jenkins. My unit on Akuze. A lot of things." That made him feel like an even bigger prick. Shepard had a lot of blood on her hands, a lot of dead soldiers under her command, and she handled it with more poise and serenity than he could ever hope to. As soon as he had something to feel guilty about, he withdrew into a shell of pain and closed himself from the world. Shepard hadn't had an easy life, and she handled things a lot better than he did.

"I'm sorry," he said. "For everything. I look at myself in the mirrior, and I hate myself. For what I've become. For what I did to you, to myself. Fuck, I know that you made the right call on Virmire. Even if you didn't…didn't love me, what you did was protocol down to the letter. I'm sorry."

She closed her eyes. A tear forced its way out, sliding down her cheek and running down the length of her scar. "It was...so hard, after...you know. I threw myself at work, hardly slept…it was bad. I just didn't understand what had happened. How I could go from being so goddamn _happy_ to whatever it was I was feeling."

"I don't expect you to forgive me," he replied. "I did a terrible thing, and ruined what was probably one of the best things that ever happened to me. I was just too much of a jackass to realize it." He was speaking from the heart, totally stripped of all pretenses. It was a rare thing for Kaidan Alenko, and it felt suitably liberating.

She paused again, appearing to be searching for the right words. "I'm not good at this stuff," she said apologetically. "Usually I let my gun do most of the talking for me. I guess what I mean is…well, I forgive you. I understand what survivor's guilt feels like, Kaidan. I do. I'm sorry things had to go the way they did, but that was a year and a half ago. I forgive you."

He blinked back tears, trying to comprehend what she'd just said. What a wonderful woman Rebecca Shepard was. To forgive him after what he did to her! He felt inexplicably, uncontrollable happy. Rebecca forgave him! A massive weight seemed to lift from his shoulders. He smiled, a full smile, the kind he'd used to smile when he'd been with Rebecca. "Thank you," he said softly.

She shook her head knowingly. "Don't worry about it," she replied. "Hell, maybe I'm just trying to boost troop morale for the shit-show in a couple days. I'm kidding."

"Thank you," he said again.

"Don't worry about it." She yawned, stretching her arms out and arching her back. "I think I need to go back to bed," she said. "Goodnight Kaidan. Get some rest."

She smiled, stood, and turned around, walking back into her quarters. The door closed behind her.

Kaidan wiped his eyes, and shook his head in grateful disbelief. He rose and walked back to his sleeper pod. His eyelids sank with each step, and he was asleep within a minute or two of closing the pod door. Kaidan Alenko slept a dreamless, contented sleep, for the first time in quite some time.


	12. Reconnecting

Hello, and sorry for the big delays! It turns out that taking Sentential Logic this semester wasn't the best idea, so I've been a bit busy with that. Anyway, this is obviously starting to build towards some climactic-type stuff, so I'd just like to take the oppurtunity to thank everybody who has read this. I appreciate your continued readership; were it not for all the feedback this story probably would have died a long time ago. There's still a fair bit left to go, and I hope everybody likes it! Anyway, enough of that. By the way, I don't own Mass Effect or any of the songs I've referenced throughout Redemption. The guilt finally got the better of me.

* * *

Chapter 12: Reconnecting

_Roy Orbison's singing for the lonely; hey, that's me, and I want you only. –Bruce Springsteen_

The tarantula went about its business as usual, doing all the usual sorts of things tarantulas did; the things it had always done, and always would do, until the end of its short, tarantula life cycle. It crawled down the side of the thin tree where it made its nest, spindly legs working in perfect unison to carry it along the trunk quickly and efficiently. Through its refracted vision, the spider noticed a small rodent some feet away. The spider hadn't yet eaten today, and it instinctually set out about its business with its usual spiderlike gusto. This particular variety of spider didn't spin webs or catch flies; it sought larger quarry. Quarry like the rodent. The tarantula reached ground level and began its slow approach on the unsuspecting mammal. Suddenly, a giant booted foot ended the spider's meager existence with a terrific _crunch._

"What a hellhole," Wrex muttered as he noticed the oozing remains beneath his foot. He shook his enormous reptilian head disdainfully and continued onwards, shotgun hanging casually from his right hand.

"Agreed," Kaidan replied, swatting a winged insect the size of a tennis ball with his armored fist. His efforts merely seemed to piss the creature off, and it buzzed about him angrily. The former marine drew his pistol and brought it down on the bug with considerable force. The disgusting creature finally succumbed. "At least on Noveria, we were allowed to shoot the bugs. This place has nothing going for it at all."

"Quiet," Garrus instructed. "There could be patrols in the jungle" Wrex chuckled faintly at the Turian's request, apparently finding humor in his eagerness to avoid the fight that the Krogan was surely praying for.

They'd been on the planet's surface for about ten hours. They were presently walking around the perimeter of the gigantic rock formation that supposedly housed the facilities ventilation system, looking for a way in. Unfortunately, Kaidan's eye had underestimated the size of the mountainous region from the picture Hackett had shown them. Rather than the mile or so he'd guessed, it was closer to 3 miles in diameter, which made walking around its roughly circular circumference a bit of a chore, especially considering the thick brush that they battled with every step. Unfortunately, the _Normandy_ didn't come stocked with big machetes, so matters were complicated. They were taking it slow, at least; they still had two days before Alnatus' deadline, and it was best not to rush and potentially overlook something important.

To make matters worse, the Mako was sitting this one out; the wilderness was too untamed, and they had all come to the consensus that beginning the mission impaled on a treetop wasn't exactly the way to start things off right. They had repelled down from the cargo bay about twenty miles and what seemed like a hundred hours ago. Kaidan felt like he'd been involved in the Bataan Death March.

They were all tired, even Wrex. Kaidan sighed and pulled his canteen from his backpack, which carried the standard alliance loadout for an extended ground op in a hostile environment. Usually any supplies beyond guns, grenades, and medigel were redundant, but sometimes circumstances such as these arose, where that was inadequate.

He took a measured sip and screwed the cap back on. Despite feeling about as sore as if he'd just gone ten rounds with a Krogan and being on a crucially important mission, during which he would likely die, he was feeling pretty good. Damned good, actually. His talk with Shepard had done a lot to raise his morale, just as she'd (presumably) joked. Most of his baggage was on the shelf for the moment; Kaidan Alenko was ready to kick ass and chew bubblegum.

Shepard was a few yards ahead, leading the way. She kept the pace challenging but bearable, though Alenko supposed that he had the brush to thank for any reprieve.

The rock formation was on their left, steep and unyielding. They certainly couldn't scale it, and there had yet to be any signs of a possible backdoor into the compound. The strike team consisted of the four of them, and Shepard's new fireteam members. Kaidan had learned the name of the young biotic was Corporal Kelvin; Rico the engineer he already knew. They had kept quiet on the trek, keeping personal chatter to an absolute minimum. Alenko saw none of the rapport he'd had with Chief Williams. They looked like good kids, but they just didn't seem like the kinds of elites Shepard used to bring on ground ops.

He chuckled to himself. What an old bastard he was becoming. He sounded like a crotchety old man telling his grandkids how back when _he_ was a boy, he'd _walked _to school. Uphill, both ways!

Kaidan's armor felt like it weighed two hundred pounds more than it did. He was reaching the absolute limits of his physical endurance. He seemed to be suffering more than any of the others, largely due to his two year lapse in military discipline. He thanked Zeus, and Thor, and anybody else who might be listening for the hardsuit's built-in temperature regulator. He'd probably already have dropped dead of heat stroke.

The greenery was too thick to see clear to the sky, but the dappled sunlight that had reached them was no longer as bright as it had been. Kaidan wasn't sure about the day/night cycle on Mernea, but he suspected the sun was setting on the tropical cesspit of a planet.

Shepard stopped, breathing heavily. She turned to face them, face streaked with sweat. Shifting in the monstrous hardsuit she wore, the Spectre sighed. "Let's call it for tonight, people. We're not going to find anything in the dark. You'll hate me for this, but I noticed a clearing about a mile and a half back where we come from. We'll set up camp there."

Garrus clacked his mandibles amicably. "You're forgiven, Commander. Another mile doesn't seem so bad."

Laboriously, the party turned around and started the last leg of the day's grueling journey.

* * *

Vargan lay awake in his bed, praising himself silently. His life had taken some interesting turns in the past weeks, and he had only himself to thank for his unexpected and profound change in fortunes.

A month ago, Vargan had been a nobody. A mercenary, a hired gun, drifting through life with nothing guiding his actions beyond the next payday. Nobody. A few smart business decisions and a few hundred dead, and Vargan was a _somebody._ He sat near the top of the most powerful criminal organization he'd ever seen, and he'd barely had to lift a finger to do it. What he had done, he'd even enjoyed!

And soon, he could be so much more. In a few weeks, he could be at the very height of galactic power, the lives and deaths of trillions decided by his smallest whim.

The mere thought made the mercenary positively giddy, but there was still work to be done before all this could come to fruition. In two days' time, momentous change would occur in Citadel Space, one way or the other. Either the council would concede their power without incident, or they would be convinced to do so in the most extreme manner possible. Truthfully, the Turian hoped the demands were not met immediately. He was eager to see _Graviton_ unleashed on another world. In fact, he found himself utterly fascinated by the prospect.

Yes, Vargan was on top of the world. One glimpse to his left at the blue, naked form of his employer sleeping quietly next to him was all the Turian needed to convince himself that he was in a truly enviable position.

A chime rang at his door. He covered the asari with the blanket and rose from the bed. A low ranking merc greeted him at the door. "Vargan, sir. We have visitors. In the jungle."

The Turian's eyes narrowed hungrily. Visitors? Perhaps he'd get yet another workout in today.

* * *

Kaidan shifted uncomfortably. He'd never been much for camping, and the seething tropical hell of Mernea was a far less enjoyable than the campground he'd been to as a young, pre-brain camp kid. He'd been trying to sleep for a while now, and was having no luck whatsoever. He was currently alone in the two-man tent, as Kelvin was on watch and would be for another two hours. Kaidan had been on first watch, keeping an eye on the south and east while Commander Shepard had guarded the other avenues of assault. He was done for the night, and he knew it was in his best interest to get some sleep.

His hardsuit lay discarded on his right. He wore a white t-shirt and shorts. Combat armor was a real bitch to take off and put on, but it was next to impossible to catch any quality sleep with one on. The likelihood of them coming under fire in the night seemed low, so Shepard had given them permission to remove their armor during sleep shifts. Additionally, sleeping in their boots after such an arduous march was a bad idea, unless they wanted to wake with disgustingly swollen and painful feet.

He kept his pistol close at hand regardless. Getting caught off guard in his skivvies was a surmountable problem. Getting caught off guard without a gun would be considerably worse.

He sighed heavily, rolling onto his stomach. So Shepard had forgiven him, after everything he'd put her through. It was as if part of the weight he'd lived with for two years was gone. Shepard had forgiven him. The rest of the weight, his reluctance to forgive himself, was still present. Alenko had a lot he felt he needed to answer for. If he'd followed the regs, which were in place for good reasons, and kept his distance from Shepard…Ashley would still be dead. Subtract all the personal factors from the mix, and the end result was still Williams getting left behind on Virmire. He'd been the ranking officer in question, and had been guarding a primary asset to the success of the mission. But damn it, that didn't make it right. He thought of Ashley's sisters. Her mother. Why had she been taken from them? What was it that made his life worth preserving over hers? Maybe it was God. Maybe it was fate. More likely, it was luck of the goddamn draw. Alenko had no idea. He didn't suppose he ever would.

"Fuck this," he muttered gruffly, sitting up. He was thinking himself in circles, and wasn't ever going to fall asleep at this rate. He resolved to go outside and stretch his legs for a moment.

Kaidan unzipped the flap of the tent and slid outside, still clad in his shorts and t-shirt. He zipped the flap back up, not wishing to be greeted by a fist sized mosquito or some other monstrosity upon his return. The first thing he noticed in the dim lighting (Mernea had a moon, but its orbit was pretty far; even in the clearing, it was dark) was Kelvin, keeping stalwart watch.

The former marine cracked his neck and wiped sweat from his brow. He glanced toward the other end of the clearing and saw Rico standing guard. Also in that direction was Shepard's tent, in which a light was still on. He wondered what she was up to at this hour. She'd have the tent to herself while Rico was on guard; Garrus and Wrex began their shift in two hours, and it was to be the last one of the night.

Impulsively, Alenko found himself striding barefoot across the grassy field towards the Commander's tent. Before he could stop himself, he had already tapped his fingers on the door flap. "Shepard? Am I disturbing you?"

There was a rustle within, and the flap unzipped. "Nope," the Spectre replied. "Come on in."

He bent down and stepped into the tent. Shepard was sitting cross-legged on her sleeping bag. She wore a tank-top and a bikini style bottom. Her beauty hadn't diminished at all in the long year and a half since he'd been with her. Her legs were as long and shapely as ever. Her body was taut, lean, and fit. Shepard wasn't beautiful in the classical sense; she didn't have the body of a supermodel. She was a warrior first, and her body was perfectly conditioned for her vocation. The beauty was still there though, permeating every aspect of her being.

The Commander gestured for him to have a seat. He did so, crossing his legs. "This place would make one hell of a resort spot with the right marketing team," he remarked dumbly. In his time spent as a misanthropic bastard, Kaidan seemed to have completely lost the ability to break the ice with a person without saying something utterly stupid.

She smiled, her scar bending with the adjusting contours of her face as she made the expression. "All it needs are a few less mercenaries and doomsday weapons and a Howard Johnson's," she said.

"Couldn't sleep?" he asked.

"Nope," she answered. "Insomnia's a bitch like that. I was thinking about Thessia. What these bastards have to answer for. How much pain has Conatix caused in the last few decades? First the stuff with all those kids, then years after they're supposed to be done and bam! A whole planet."

He didn't have much to say in reply. Her presence was alien to him; he didn't really know how to speak to her anymore. "We'll get them," he said after a moment. "We've handled worse."

She frowned. "In some ways, these guys are getting better results than Saren ever did. In about ten minutes they caused more chaos and death than Saren was able to bring about in his entire campaign."

"These guys are pissants next to Saren. They've done some bad things. Really bad things, I'm not arguing that point. But the Sovereign…that has to count for something."

"It does," she said. "Just…this whole thing stinks. I have a feeling it's going to get worse before it gets better."

He didn't want to affirm her fears, but he was in agreement on that point. He had a bad feeling about this mission. It had been a long road to get here. From the shootout in his apartment to this moment, a lot had happened. He somehow didn't get the impression that this would end smoothly or quietly.

He changed the subject. "So," he began. "What were the last two years like for you?" He realized as he finished the sentence that it wasn't the most tactful thing he'd ever said. He hoped he hadn't offended her.

"Not very eventful. Lots of patrols, lots of mundane military stuff. Hackett's not my handler anymore; the new guy makes him look positively low maintenance. There's always garbage the Alliance needs taken out."

He spoke again, impulsively, thoughtlessly. "Did you…meet anybody?"

Her eyes lowered, as if she was unwilling or unable to look at him. He'd overstepped his bounds in a big way. What business was it of his? Kaidan Alenko had had his chance, and he'd managed to fuck it up righteously.

"Look, I'm sorry," he said quickly, backpedaling. "It wasn't my place to ask you that question."

She looked up at him, and he saw that her eyes had welled up. She shook her head, fighting back tears. "No, she said. "There hasn't been anyone else. You know, I think I was holding a torch for you." Her voice quavered. "I always…I always just hoped that somehow, you'd come back to me. I was sure it wouldn't happen, but…"

She paused, sighing heavily. "There was always that little voice in my head, telling me it was temporary. Telling me that you'd get yourself sorted out and want to be with me again." She sniffled loudly. Shepard seemed so vulnerable, so human in this moment. Alenko looked at her earnestly, overcome with emotion.

"Oh Becky," he said. Before he was even aware of what he was doing, he reached for her, drawing her close to him and kissing her fiercely. She returned the kiss, wrapping her arms around him. Her touch sent little electric tingles through his body. He lost himself in the kiss, and kissed her again. She ran her hands down his back towards his waist, pulling his shirt up over his head. It all came rushing back to him in a flood of emotion; no, that wasn't right. Kaidan realized that despite all of the pain he'd felt since the tragedy on Virmire, he'd never really ceased to love her. He had lost his way for a time, but he could see the road ahead of him clearly now.

He gently lowered her down, never breaking the kiss. He reached over and switched the electric lantern off. She smiled at him and pulled him on top of her.

* * *

Shepard sighed contentedly as Alenko put his shorts back on. "I missed you," she said, leaning in for a kiss before pulling her tank top back on."It's nice just to have you around again."

"It's nice to _be_ around," he replied with a warm smile. It was the most genuine smile he'd smiled in a long time. He was reminded of what had drawn him to Shepard in the first place. When he was with her, he was all smiles. He imagined what he might be doing right now had he not broken things off with Kate, whatever things those might have been. Kate was a nice girl, but…he _loved_ Shepard. It was still the case. "Though I think we may have just gotten you a nice court martial."

She shook her head with a smile. He lied down on his back and she snuggled in next to him. "Doubt it. If we save their asses again and they try to pull that, the media would have a field day."

All the tension was gone from his body. Now that it was gone, he realized what a staggering amount of it he'd actually had. "I was so stupid," he said ruefully. "I had a great thing and I threw it away."

She kissed him. "It's not too late, you know," she replied. As he worked out the implications of that statement, a single gunshot tore apart the relative silence of the night, ripping him from his contemplation.

"Fuck!" he cursed. Shepard was already off him, crouched over her hardsuit and weapons. She handed him her pistol and nodded at the tent flap as she began to put the armor on as fast as she could.

He moved towards the flap and unzipped it, peering outside with his weapon at the ready. He looked outside just in time to see Rico go down. A single shot sounded, and a cloud of red mist exploded from the back of her head.

Wrex charged out of his tent in full battle fury, firing his shotgun at the sound, when another shot rang out from the nearby brush. The Krogan staggered as Kaidan realized that the big alien was ensnared in some sort of net. Wrex was being electrocuted! The battlemaster fell to his knees and finally slumped, unconscious.

An explosion rocked the ground near the tent that Garrus presumably still occupied. The blast caused the small shelter to collapse on itself. Shit, shit, shit.

Kaidan's eyes widened as he saw Wrex's assailant step out of the jungle, clutching what looked like a grenade launcher but was obviously loaded with nets. It was Vargan.


	13. Without a Paddle

Hello everyone! I'm well aware that it's been forever and a day since the last update, a sad fact for which I sincerely apologize. I've been rather busy, but I'm hoping to keep things moving along steadily from here on out. Note that this chapter is around a thousand words longer than some of the last few, which is a lame, half-hearted apology for how long I've kept my small but dedicated fanbase waiting. Thanks, you guys are the best, seriously. Were it not for the great feedback and reviews, I'm sure that I'd have picked this story apart and moved on to some other doomed project by now. Anyway, enjoy the chapter!

* * *

Chapter 13: Without a Paddle

_The thick skin of defiance makes you wage a war you didn't start. –Dropkick Murphys_

The Turian shouted her name at the top of his lungs, pure malice in his tone. "Shepard!" he roared, standing in the middle of the camp with his assault rifle resting on his shoulder. Kaidan felt a hand grab his shoulder and nearly jumped, startled out of his intentness.

"Christ," he whispered as he realized the hand belonged to Shepard. She had made it into her hardsuit. Good. "It's your call, Shepard."

Her face crinkled in uncertainty.

"Shepard! We've got one of your men alive out here!" A trio of mercenaries emerged from the jungle, one of whom swiftly walked out of Kaidan's limited line of sight. This made the odds about…damn, he wasn't sure where they stood. Shepard, himself…possibly Garrus, assuming the Turian was alive inside the collapsed tent. One marine was gone, the other was apparently in dire straits, and Wrex was unconscious. _Fuck._

The man walked back into Kaidan's cone of sight, roughly hauling Corporal Kelvin into the center of the camp. The marine's face was a contorted in an agonized grimace; Kaidan noted a wound in his leg. The second sniper shot from before.

"Tell your Commander to come out here," Vargan said, pushing the barrel of his rifle under the marine's jaw.

"Corporal John Kelvin. Serial number 2516107." Kaidan shook his head. The marine was tough, he had to give him that. It took some stones to pull the old name, rank, and serial number with a gun in your face.

"I told you to get her out here," Vargan said, before roughly shoving a long, spindly finger into the bullet wound on Kelvin's leg. Kelvin collapsed to one knee, crying out in pain. "You have five seconds, Shepard. I'm going to start counting, and when I hit zero, Corporal Kelvin is going to join Private Headless out here, the crew of the _Alexander_, and the population of Thessia in hell. You don't want that, do you?"

Kaidan checked his gun as rapidly as possible, making sure it at least had a clip in it. He searched Shepard's eyes for confirmation, and saw only resignation.

"Five."

He grabbed her by the shoulder, drew her to him. Kaidan Alenko kissed Rebecca Shepard deeply, very possibly for the last time.

"Four."

He pulled back, gave her a look. _Are you sure?_, it asked her imploringly. She nodded. They laid their weapons on the floor of the tent and unzipped the flap. As they stepped out, what seemed like a kind of grin crossed the Turian's features.

"One," he said slyly, firing a single shot into Kelvin's head.

"You fucking bastard!" Kaidan snarled, fists clenched at his side. He found himself wishing for some armor. _Any_ armor. He didn't even care about the quality; with these odds it would take more than a hardsuit. It was difficult to come across as a hard man when you were in your underwear.

"Alenko," the Turian regarded him coolly. "How are things? It's been a while. I shot you, remember?"

"I remember. Remember when Wrex kicked your ass and you ran like a bitch? You don't scare me, you piece of shit. Your track record for fair fights is pretty piss poor. You talk tough, , but so far all I've seen you do is shoot your allies in the back, shoot a drunk with a bad hangover, kill a bunch of civilians, and execute a man in cold blood."

"It's all about the results. The two hundred people I killed on the _Alexander_ speak volumes about me."

"So," Shepard said in an exasperated tone. "You're Vargan. And here I expected Darth Vader, or at least Mussolini. Not some little pissant with attitude problems. If you're gonna kill us, kill us. If you're gonna capture us, capture us. Just please, for the love of God, shut the fuck up about it."

"The little lady is defiant," Vargan said with a chuckle. He approached her, walked a circle around her as he eyed her appraisingly. "I'm not impressed. LaRue, her armor if you please."

The ugliest of the mercs, a stocky man with a large boil on the side of his face, approached Shepard as Vargan pulled a pair of handcuffs off his belt. "Hands behind your back, Alenko."

The Canadian glowered at the Turian and complied. Thin fingers grabbed him roughly, locking his hands in the cuffs. Unexpectedly, Vargan delivered a punishing kick to the back of his knee. His leg buckled and he fell face first in the dirt. The Turian dragged him back up to his feet.

The ugly merc, LaRue, pointed a shotgun at Shepard and nodded his head. "Take off the armor."

She raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"Take the armor off, now. Think I'm dumb enough to get punched in the head with motorized Colossus armor?"

"Probably," Shepard said with a sigh. "But at any rate, have it your way. I don't need armor to kill people like you."

She removed the upper half of her hardsuit, revealing her tanktop. "Nice rack," the pig remarked crassly. Wordlessly, she removed the pants, and stood barefoot in only the bikini bottoms and tank top.

"And legs. We could have some fun, you and I."

Shepard's eyebrow went up again. "Oh, we will," she replied, a dangerous edge to her voice. "Count on it."

LaRue cuffed her hands behind her back and grinned oafishly. As Alenko looked on in helpess outrage, the vile son of a bitch reached his arms around her and grabbed her breasts. She weathered the assault stoically, but the fear and revulsion in her eyes was plain for the former lieutenant to see.

"Get your fucking hands off of her!" he bellowed, prompting a sharp backhand from the Turian.

"If Mr. LaRue wishes to inspect the goods, he'll do it without fucking lip from you. LaRue," the Turian continued. "Later. It can wait. Now, we're taking the three of you prisoner for now, until I decide how I want to kill you."

_Three. _It suddenly dawned on him. _Three!_ Shepard, Wrex, and himself. The bastards didn't realize Garrus was in the collapsed tent. Since the ordeal had begun, not a single enemy combatant had ever laid eyes on the Turian and lived long enough to report back to his or her superiors. He'd been sniping at the showdown by the fountain on Thessia. That merc prick they'd captured had seen him, but Kaidan had seen to that son of a bitch personally. The entire team of Asari commandos had been slaughtered on the scene; it all made sense.

This gave them the edge, he realized. He was sure Rebecca would have made the connection as well, sexual assault or no. Without warning, LaRue struck the commander with the butt of his shotgun, knocking her unconscious. Alenko opened his mouth to threaten the man when a heavy blow crashed down on the back of his head. He saw stars, and then knew no more.

* * *

Wrex opened his eyes lazily. "Hmm," he muttered aloud, as he took note of his immediate surroundings. He was in a small room, adorned with a human sized cot and a human sized toilet. He suddenly remembered his last moments of consciousness, shaking his enormous head in frustration. He remembered the net, the electricity. Most of all, he remembered Vargan, the Turian coward who'd been nothing but trouble since Wrex had met him in Chora's Den all that time ago. The Krogan rose to his feet stiffly. His weapons were gone, of course, but at least he still had his armor. He realized with some irritation that his biotic amplifier had been confiscated. His biotic abilities were innate up to a point, but without the amp it was a worthless skill in actual combat.

This left him with his considerable strength and resilience to work with. Wrex's lip curled in a thin smile. However this went down, it would be interesting. The Krogan snapped into alertness as the door unlatched. Swiftly, he put his body as near the door as he was able. It opened a bit, and a hand reached in with a repulsive looking meal. They were feeding him, huh? Wrex's smile grew as his powerful hand closed around the small, fragile wrist in the doorway. The Krogan pulled as hard as he could on the man's arm, ignoring the snapping of bone. He swung his body around to allow the door to open, dragging the human to his feet. The Krogan frowned when he realized that the arm he'd broken belonged to an emaciated human clad in a white jumpsuit. Probably one of the L2 prisoners, Wrex noted sourly. Then he saw the trio of armed mercenaries pointing shotguns at him from the hallway. Behind them, arms crossed behind her back, was the asshole himself, Vargan.

"Clever," Wrex noted with a grunt, releasing his grip on the L2, who fell to his knees sobbing. "If you were really smart, you would have killed me in the jungle."

"I just wanted to see how you were settling in," the Turian replied. "You went and broke the poor biotic's arm."

"You talk big," Wrex replied, "but you're through and you know it. You let some dangerous people into your compound, Turian. They may be caged right now, but we _will_ get out."

"I was planning on torturing you," Vargan said with a small chuckle. "I'm not sure it would be advisable for me to try. You're the type who'd rather get shot and killed first, eh?"

"Come in here and find out," Wrex growled.

"You'd die before you let me strap you down to a table, wouldn't you? It's unfortunate that Commander Shepard is not you. One of my men is seeing to her now."

The Krogan snarled, rushing for the door, when all the merc in the center fired his shotgun. The kinetic buffers on his armor absorbed the impact, sent him staggering inside. In that brief window, the other two mercs quickly closed the door.

Wrex heard it lock in place and punched the steel as hard as he could. He wasn't sure he could bring down this base all by himself; there was a fair chance of it, but things would be a lot better if Shepard kept herself alive and in one piece. Hopefully, his survival and hers were not intertwined, but-aw hell, the Krogan was genuinely worried about her. He'd gotten to know the Spectre pretty well in their time together, and she was one of a handful of humans he could respect. Wrex shook his head, cursed, and tried to comfortably arrange his sizeable bulk on the tiny, human cot.

* * *

Martin Novak truly hated his job. The lifetime mercenary had been around the block a few times, had worked with some pretty good outfits, some run of the mill outfits, and one or two groups that were downright bad. No job had ever given off such bad vibes as being part of Mihra Alnatus' little army. Shit, he was just a mercenary. Here, there were actual expectations of him. He was a goddamn number, a statistic in Alnatus' power play. If her ascension called for his death, he'd fucking die.

He was a little ways into middle age, and one thing he hadn't planned on was getting himself killed this late in his career. He'd survived in this business as long as he had by being discreet; never take too much, never cause too much trouble. Keep things low key. Blowing up a fucking planet? Calling up the Citadel Council with ultimatums for galactic domination? Decidedly acts of a much higher key.

It didn't help that his new boss was batshit insane. Vargan was a perfect example of all the things that made Novak frightened of Turians. He was dangerous, sadistic, ill-tempered, and very good at what he did.

The merc shook his head. In a smaller outfit, everyone mattered. Everyone usually worked together to bring in a haul that was generally divided up pretty evenly. He wasn't even bringing in big money! He was a goddamn expendable, and all he needed to further cement his status as a goddamn expendable was a red Starfleet uniform.

His patrol was supposed to last for another hour and a half, but Novak was in a bad mood, and he had to take a piss. "Fuck it," he said aloud. He wasn't being paid enough anyway, and if he had to take a piss, he was damn well going to take one. He left his patrol route, heading for the nearest bathroom, a small single occupancy room. As he stepped inside, he tripped over something metallic.

He looked down, and squinted as he saw the object he'd stumbled on. "A vent cover?" he muttered. No sooner had the words left Novak's lips when he felt the unmistakable press of a gun barrel against his temple. "Well, shit," he cursed.

A three fingered hand grabbed him roughly by the shoulder and spun him against the wall. Novak watched as this new Turian locked the door, of the small restroom.

"I need information, and you're going to give it to me," the Turian said coldly, pointing the pistol at him unwaveringly.

The wheels in Novak's head began to spin madly as he considered his new situation. What did he really owe this outfit? They weren't worth getting killed for; he knew that much. He smiled shakily. "I think we can work something out."

* * *

Shepard awoke groggily, lying on her side in a damnably bright room. She grunted her discomfort as she squinted, trying to adjust to the blinding light. Shit. Where was she? She remembered…oh God, she remembered what that son of a bitch LaRue had done to her, and then she remembered being clubbed with a shotgun. And here she was. She quickly took stock of her situation to the best of her present ability. Her hands were cuffed behind her back, and she was still in her underwear. Swell.

"Damn it, Shepard," she chided herself. She'd made all the wrong calls in the jungle. She shouldn't have made such an obvious camp, and she shouldn't have been caught with her proverbial pants down. As _right_ as it had felt to make love to Kaidan, there was a time and a place for that sort of thing. In the middle of the night in a tent in an untamed wilderness crawling with hostile targets was generally wrong by both criteria.

_Okay Becky,_ she thought to herself. _Keep your cool, and look for an out._ Kicking herself wasn't going to get her out of here. And besides, these mercs had wanted Kaidan long before things had escalated; he was probably being used for whatever purpose had initially drawn their attention. She'd be damned if she lost him again, after all this. She still hardly believed he'd come around. Shepard had wanted, _needed_, to repair things with him for so long, that now that they seemed to be fixed, she wasn't sure if she quite sure if she trusted it. The breakup had blindsided her, crushed her. It seemed now, that he had at least begun to lay his demons to rest, and find it within himself to love her again, to stop blaming her for saving his life.

_Goddamn it, Shepard, cut the shit and find a way out of here._ She'd sidetracked herself on that tangent, and she really didn't have the time to allow such things. Her eyes had finally adjusted. She sat up, hands still cuffed behind her. She was on a table, the kind you'd see in a doctor's office. She crossed her legs and looked around the room. Small. Bare, except for this table. Before she could make further observations, the door swung open. LaRue, the bastard who'd felt her up in the jungle, walked in. He wore camo pants and a t-shirt, instead of the armor she'd seen him in before.

"Hello baby," he said with a shit-eating grin. "I've been checking in on you every half an hour to see if you were awake. I want you to be awake, you see. Wouldn't be any fun if you were asleep."

Her stomach lurched, but she kept her expression cold and professional. This son of a bitch was going to rape her, and she wasn't in much of a position to stop it. Shepard felt herself gripped in icy fear, of the sort she'd only known twice in her life. The second time had been that sickening moment on Virmire, when she'd had to make that toughest of decisions. The first time had been the night when she'd gotten the scar on her face, the night when one of her fellow Tenth Street Reds had tried to accomplish just what LaRue intended. The resulting knife fight had left her scarred and out of the gang, and had left him bleeding out in an alley. This time, she was cuffed and defenseless. The fear was even stronger.

"You see," he continued, "I want you to enjoy this as much as I will." His grin widened.

Rebecca felt a flash of rage. "Listen, you Cro-Magnon dipshit," she spat venomously. "Think about this for a moment. I'm going to bust out of here sooner or later. It's a fucking given. You know who I am. And when I do bust out of here, my fucking rapist will be the first one of you bastards I come gunning for. Go through with this and death will be a mercy by the time I'm finished with you." Her voice wavered a bit at the end, and she hated herself for it. She was terrified. She knew it, and LaRue knew it.

"I think I'll take my chances," he replied, approaching her. He grabbed her shoulder with one hand, and stroked the side of her face with the other. She cringed at his touch.

He noted the movement with a harsh laugh. "How about a kiss, baby?" he said, leaning in. He crushed her mouth with his own, nearly choking her with rancid breath. She felt his tongue invade her mouth roughly and, operating on pure instinct, bit down as hard as she could. A feral scream escaped his lips as he pulled away, blood running out of his mouth and down his chin. She spat blood, and the tip of his tongue, our of her mouth and regarded him airily.

"How are you going to tell if your coffee is sweet enough now?"

He spat blood. "You fucking bitch," he said, though now it sounded closer to "thuckin' bih."

She chuckled at his difficulty. "What's the matter? Spectre got your tongue?" It was cheesy as all hell, but sometimes that worked just fine. It definitely elicited a response, as LaRue backhanded her savagely. Her head snapped to the side, and it did hurt, but it was the kind of normal, wholesome pain that she could deal with. "You hit like a Salarian," she laughed.

He grabbed her roughly, forced her down on her back. "Enough messing around," he growled. His hand ran down her side and grabbed the top of her underwear. Christ.

"Wait!" she yelled frantically.

"Yes?" he asked, humoring her with a cruel smile.

"There's something you should know first. You didn't do a very good job cuffing me." She smiled, bringing her free hands around and revealing the bobby pin she'd stuck in her waistband before putting her armor on in the tent.

His expression went from a smile, to a confused frown, to a mask of abject horror as her hands came about, boxing his ears and snapping back to slam him in the face. His nose shattered and began pumping blood as she sat up, spun around, and kicked him in the balls. "Shit," he gasped as she hit him again, pain flaring in her knuckles as she connected with a hard left hook to the eye. She grabbed his head and drove it down onto her bare knee, doing less damage to him and more damage to herself than she'd intended.

He grabbed her, threw her off the table. She hit the wall with a thud and dropped to the floor. He was there in an instant, delivering a punishing kick to her stomach as she tried to climb to her feet. She choked back an agonized scream as he hit her again. He was strong, and pissed, and he had her on the ropes. He kicked her again, and again, and when he was finally done kicking her, she was in too much pain to climb to her feet.

She became aware of a tear running down her cheek and hardened. _You're not a fucking damsel in distress. You're a Spectre, and you've killed hundreds like this piece of shit. Now get up and kick his ass!_ Resolve restored, she tried to climb to her feet, and sank down again. She couldn't get up. Goddamn it. She was lying on her stomach, head facing him. His legs were large in her line of sight. Without warning, his pants dropped around his ankles.

"Ready now?" he asked, confidence restored. The sight of his bare legs and the knowledge of his cruel intent filled Rebecca Shepard with a righteous fury unlike any she'd ever known. She sprang to her feet, delivering an uppercut to his chin as she rose. His head snapped back and she hit him with a body shot. He staggered back, bumping into the medical table. He threw a haymaker, clocked her in the jaw. She hit the wall behind her, blood dribbling out of her mouth.

"Come on," she snarled. He threw another punch, connecting solidly with her right eye. She gasped in pain as the eye clouded over, redness seeping into her vision. She was taking a solid beating, and though she was confident she was going to win at this point, she still had a lot of mercenaries to deal with. This needed to end while she was still fit to deal with them. He threw a great, lumbering punch with his right hand and she got around it, grabbing his forearm tightly with both hands. "Snap," she said victoriously, before breaking it with a savage twist in just the right spot. He let out a choked sob as she bashed the area of the fracture with her elbow.

"I think you're done," Shepard said, panting. Her right eye was all but useless at the moment, her knee throbbed, she was pretty sure some of the knuckles on her left hand might be broken, and she was going to have bruises the size of Antarctica on her stomach. The woman sighed.

LaRue roared, lunging at her, trying to bring his left around to hit her. She grabbed it, spun him around, and forced him up against the wall. "Tell me where my crewmates are," she commanded. He let out a hoarse chuckle of defiance and she slammed his head against the metal wall with savage force.

"I ain't tellin' you shit," he gasped, prompting another run-in with the wall. He spat blood and teeth onto the floor. "You're gonna kill me anyway."

"I don't think you get it, asshole. I _am_ gonna kill you, and you have yourself to thank for it. But how badly I fuck you up before I do it is entirely up to you. Tell me where my friends are, where I can get some weapons, and where your boss is, and it might even be quick. I don't like rapists though, so I'm not making any promises."

"Go to hell," he grunted.

Shepard sighed, and snapped his neck with a very satisfying twist. She doubted she'd ever killed anyone as deserving of it as this asshole, but as much as she would have liked to make good on her bluff and torture the son of a bitch, she didn't have the time. She let the corpse fall to the floor and walked to the medical table, leaning against it and taking deep breaths. She was in a bad way. She wiped her eye and found that it did nothing for the cloudiness. She'd probably have to have a doctor look at it, if she ever made it back to civilization. Her gut was all kinds of messed up from his kicks, as well. Only know, as the adrenaline wore down, did she realize how bad she was hurting. She needed to find some medigel; it wouldn't really fix her, but it would give her what she needed to carry on.

Rebecca closed her eyes, taking in another deep breath. She was screwed. Her combat skill wasn't going to do her a lot of good in her underwear, never mind the fact that she had no idea where she was or where the others were.

And then, like a gift from the Lord Himself, Garrus Vakarian came crashing through the ceiling, vent shaft slamming to the ground beside her as he landed. He rose to his feet quickly. "Commander!" he said, visibly excited. "You're alright."

"All things considered," she said dryly. "Good timing." She gestured at LaRue's lifeless body on the floor.

"Sorry," the Turian said, rather sheepishly. "It's just fortunate I wasn't captured or killed in the jungle."

"For sure," she agreed weakly. "I'm hurt, Garrus. He did a number on me. If you've got medigel, now's the time."

The Turian looked at her, a little shock registering across his avian features. "Damn it," he swore. "I'm sorry, Commander. I should have been here sooner." He handed her a packet of medigel, and she eagerly tore it open, applying it liberally to her abdomen, her knuckles, and her knee. The eye was shit out of luck for the time being. Thankfully, it wasn't the eye she aimed with, so she'd probably still be a pretty good shot with a rifle.

"It's okay," she replied through gritted teeth as the local anesthetic ebbed away her pain. "We've got bigger fish to fry. What do you know about this place?"

Garrus' mandibles clacked in amusement. "It's a funny story, really. The merc I picked to shake down for information is none too fond of his job, and uploaded blueprints for everywhere he's authorized to be in. So we have a location on Wrex, and their armory. He suspects that Alenko is downstairs, in the research labs. There's a special detachment of mercs who work that area. Roughly two dozen. In addition to the Conatix scientists and the docking bay for the weapon."

"The weapon is here?" she asked, all business. "How? How does it launch from an underground facility?"

"It turns out that the whole mountain opens up to allow it to lift off. Coincidentally, that's where I found the ventilation system. I trailed them to the facilities main entrance, snooped around a bit, and found a way in."

"The whole mountain…" she repeated in disbelief. "Alright. We'll get some weapons, bust Wrex out, and storm the subbasement, where we'll secure the L2 hostages, kill that son of a bitch Vargan and the Asari, and find out just what the hell is going on here. Has _Normandy _been updated on the situation?"

"Yes," he replied, removing the assault rifle from the back of his armor and handing it to her. "We'll still need to get you some armor, but this should help for the time being."

"Much appreciated," the Spectre replied, checking the clip out of habit. Despite the fact that the thing was good for tens of thousands of rounds, her days of brandishing derelict old guns back in the slums of Earth had instilled the habit deeply.

"Alright, Garrus," Shepard said, steeling herself. "Two Spectres, one of which being practically naked, versus somewhere around a hundred hard-bitten mercenaries."

"They won't know what hit them," the Turian replied, drawing his pistol. It was time to go to work.


	14. Revelations

Hello again! This one came out pretty quickly, all things considered. As usual, enjoy! And don't hesitate to review; I looove reviews!

* * *

Chapter 14: Revelations

_My only pleasure is to hear you cry. –Mercyful Fate_

_If you're into evil, you're a friend of mine. –AC/DC_

Alenko groaned and rolled over. His eyes snapped open as he felt the unmistakable sensation of falling as he plummeted three feet to a floor that was incredibly cold. "Shit," he muttered, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. He didn't seem to be concussed, at least. Fortunate, considering the circumstances he'd gone to sleep under. He rolled off of his now throbbing shoulder onto his stomach, climbing to his knees.

"You're awake," a voice said to his left. He turned abruptly towards the sound and found himself looking at a guy in a white jumpsuit. Glancing about the room, he realized he was in a small cell. The room was sterile white, with two cots, one of which he'd just fallen off of. The guy in the jumpsuit sat cross-legged atop the other one.

Matters of Shepard aside, Alenko hadn't fully reverted back to his old self, and he wasn't likely to. He was still an asshole in numerous ways. Principle among these was how he typically dealt with people. "Who the fuck are you?" he asked brusquely, rising to his feet and sitting on the cot across from the man.

"Name's Ted," the man replied. "I guess you're a biotic, otherwise you wouldn't be in this cage." Ted was probably around his age, and blonde. He was of average build, but he had a hell of an unkempt beard going on. If he was a biotic and they needed him for whatever reason, they'd have to keep him well fed so he'd be able to perform. The beard suggested he'd been here for a while though.

"You're an L2?" Kaidan asked. What the hell was really going on here? Why did they need biotics?

"Yep. Not sure what they want with us, but there's a bunch of us in cells around here. A week or two ago, they brought us all into a big lab, and some eggheads ran some tests on us. A few dozen of us were taken away, and the rest of us were brought back here."

"Great," Kaidan replied irritably. "They throw me in general population."

"Excuse me?" Ted asked, confused by the statement.

"I take it you were abducted? Grabbed from your home or something?"

"Close enough," Ted said scornfully. "I was at a nightclub in New York, and these big gorillas took me without much of a fight. Now I'm here."

"Well Ted, I wasn't abducted," Kaidan replied. "These sons of bitches took out about three hundred and fifty billion on Thessia. Destroyed the whole planet. I was with a strike team sent to kill them." No sense sugarcoating it. At this point, if he got Mihra Alnatus in his sights he was shooting to kill.

The man looked a bit ill. "They…blew up a planet? Christ."

"Yeah," Alenko replied. "I was there. It wasn't pretty. So I need whatever information you can give me about this place. Whatever you know about the layout, how many men they've got, what they're packing…anything."

"Shit man, I'm a damn accountant, I don't know what they're packing! Guns! Enough guns to kill you and several hundred of your closest friends. So are you also here to rescue us? Tell me that was part of it. I don't wanna die here." Alenko found himself wishing for a different cellmate. Sure, Ted had been through a lot, but that didn't change the fact that he ranked about a Jar-Jar on the annoyance scale.

"Listen," Alenko said, trying to keep his tone civil. He didn't need to alienate this guy, his only ally at present. "We're in some deep shit. We've all been captured, and we're running out of time. Depending on how long I've been out, they might be mobilizing in less than a day. Earth is probably next. That has to be our first priority. In short, nobody is getting extracted until all these sons of bitches are all kinds of dead. Whoever's still kicking when the dust settles is more than welcome on the _Normandy._"

Ted's eyes widened. "The _Normandy_? You came on the _Normandy_? Commander Shepard is here?"

A few months ago, Kaidan would have reacted violently to the rampant Shepard fandom that had overrun the galaxy and was now on display in his cellmate. Now, he actually felt a sort of pride. Like he was one of the good guys again, helping to fight the good fight on humanity's darling, the _Normandy. _

"Yeah," he replied. "Keep your head down, don't do anything to draw attention to yourself, and if any of us walk out of here, you will too."

The man smiled a smile of hope, mingled with uncertainty. "I never did get your name," he said.

"It's Alenko," Kaidan replied. "Kaidan Alenko. Now think hard, Ted. Any information you can give me is going to make me better equipped to save your ass, and probably Earth."

Ted frowned, face scrunching up in thought. "Okay," he said. "We're in some kind of cell block. We're on the same level as the lab where they examined us. I never see the same guards, and I've been here for months, so they either have a shit load of them who all rotate duty shifts or they have a short life expectancy. I'm guessing the former. There's been a new guy giving them orders recently. Turian. Real psycho, as far as I can tell."

"You really don't know the half of it," Kaidan said with a sigh. "How about an Asari? The Turian'd be answering to her."

"That's pretty much all I know, man," Ted replied, shaking his head ruefully. "I wish I could help you more, but-"

The door of the cell opened, and Vargan stood in the threshold. "Kaidan, my friend," the Turian said heartily. "We're assembling all of you biotic scum for some tests. You're exempt, of course, Alenko. You're guaranteed to move on to the next phase. I don't want some damned scientific readings to keep you from fulfilling your true potential."

"Well aren't you just a fucking paradigm of charity," Alenko replied, rising to his feet.

"Now Kaidan, that wasn't nice. Now shut your mouth before I chop it up," Vargan said dangerously, hand resting on the hilt of his combat talon.

Alenko resisted the urge to be a smartass; he was badly outmatched here, and the last thing he needed was to say something that would get him killed.

The Turian drew a pistol and gestured that the two of them walk out into the hall with him. They complied, walking out into a long cell block where a couple dozen guards were bringing a large quantity of prisoners out of their cells. Kaidan estimated that there must be around a hundred and fifty of them, all being led in the same direction. They were herded through a large pair of double doors into a big lab room, filled with scientists checking instruments and working on computers. There were a few examination tables, as well as a lot of nasty looking instruments, with long, sharp blades.

The guards ushered them in at gunpoint. Alenko could practically smell the fear on the L2s. Some of them had been here for months, and he doubted they'd been treated well.

"Here they are, Kasparov," Vargan said, addressing a frail looking old man in a lab coat. "Run your tests. Alnatus wants you to know we're on a time table."

Kaidan frowned. Either he'd been out for a bit longer than he'd previously estimated, or they were moving against the Council early. The botched assault had probably done nothing but bring about the destruction of Earth even sooner.

"This one," Vargan said, pointing at Kaidan with a long finger, "has already been selected."

The scientist shook his head pointedly. "I need to take some readings anyway. We can't have him in the machine if he's not up to par."

In the machine? Kaidan felt his stomach sink. Whatever the fuck that meant, it probably wasn't all that good for him.

"Fine," Vargan replied huffily. "Be quick about it."

Kaidan became aware of a guard behind him, and before he could react, the man had knocked him to his knees with a heavy blow to the back. A heavy hand rested on his shoulder, keeping him down. He thrashed, trying to break the hold, when the scientist grabbed him by the head, forcing him to look down at the floor. A sudden, excruciating pain ripped through his head as the old man stuck something into the jack for his biotic amp. Energy surged through his mind, tearing through his thoughts. He became aware that he was screaming, but the pain was so raw, so unlike anything he'd ever experienced, that he couldn't stop himself.

It seemed to go on forever. He fought to keep from passing out, even as the pain lanced down from its origin, blooming across his entire body in ravaging waves. After the passing of what was probably ten or fifteen seconds but felt like years, the man withdrew his instrument, whatever it was.

Alenko shivered as the last wave of pain shot through him, this time reaching all the way down to his toes. He looked up at the doctor, who was presently looking at the readings the device had given him. The device itself looked a bit like a tricorder from _Star Trek_, but with a long, sharp attachment coming out of the bottom of it. The son of a bitch had practically stuck a dagger in the back of his head.

"You'll be fine," Kasparov told him. "The device does no lasting interior damage. I was merely gauging your capacity for harnessing the energy of element zero."

Kaidan glared at the old man. "You worked for Conatix, didn't you?" he spat with contempt.

"Yes, Mr. Alenko. In fact, I remember you. I installed your implants, all those years ago, and in some ways, I have you to thank for my position here. If you hadn't ruined the BAaT work we were doing, I'd probably still be working for Conatix. This is a much more lucrative venture."

Alenko sneered at the man. He had long come to terms with what had happened with Vyrnnus, and he wasn't going to let this son of a bitch mess with his head.

"Ah," Kasparov replied. "Excellent readings. You're perhaps the strongest biotic I've interviewed."

"Is that what you call that? An interview? Christ," Kaidan said.

"Did that hurt, Alenko?" Vargan asked smugly. Kaidan glowered at the Turian. He had to play for time, he realized. It would probably take them a while to subject all the other L2s to the excruciating interview process, but he was in no position to escape and he had to keep this going as long as possible, to allow the possibility of Garrus coming through in the eleventh hour.

"No," Kaidan replied hotly. "It almost felt like banging your mother." He realized that this was a massive stretch, as insults went, but he was drawing blanks as to proceed. He needed to stall, but he wasn't sure how in his position.

The Turian's mandibles clacked in amusement. "I wonder what being in the machine is going to feel like," he said knowingly. "Will it feel like banging my mother?"

"Well, it'd help if I knew what the fuck you were talking about. Come on, you're a crazy bastard. Aren't you pretty much required to monologue about your evil plans?"

Vargan nodded his head. "Why not? If you're afraid before the end, so much the better. Kasparov, indulge the man with an explanation. Tell him exactly how he's going to die."

The scientist looked at Vargan, confused, and then shifted his gaze to Kaidan when he noticed the Turian's hand on his pistol. "Very well," he said. He beckoned over one of the other eggheads and handed him the scanner. "Test them," he told the man. "Use your discretion."

"Where to begin?" Kasparov mused, shifting his attention back to Alenko. "Much of it you already know. My colleagues and I were the leading researchers in the field of human enhancement through element zero. It's truly a remarkable compound, so unlike anything else we've discovered. After Conatix had disbanded, I discreetly continued my research, learning everything I could about it. I learned to harness it in ways previously unimaginable. It has so many uses."

The scientist paused to allow him to absorb the information and continued. "There's a lot of money in weapons development. I started to consider ways of weaponizing the element. Besides human biotics, what else could be done? It occurred to me that being able to strategically employ powerful gravity wells could be a very valuable military asset. But I was smart, Alenko. Crafty. There was no way in the world such a weapon could be made legal, so I made some discreet inquiries, shopped the idea around. By the time I'd met Mihra Alnatus, all of the mathematics for the weapon were completed. We contacted my old research team and Mihra had this facility constructed. Six months ago, the base became operational."

"We got started, modifying a military frigate into the most advanced weapon the galaxy has ever known. But we needed a power source! All of the math was in place; the _Graviton_ was ready to fire, if only we could get enough concentrated power in place. Our first thought was to make a converter that would allow an eezo mass similar to a ship's engine to be converted into the gravity wells required, but it was simply too much of a strain on resources."

"The problem was that eezo, malleable as it is, is in almost an entirely different form as an engine. When you use your implants, the energy is in a very specific form, that allows you to perform the kinds of feats you perform. What we needed was a way to harness large amounts of that energy as it was, without having to convert it from a different form. Inspiration struck me. Why go to so much trouble, when a ready source of element zero already existed in exactly the form we needed it to?"

"You son of a bitch," Kaidan replied in numb shock, as the pieces clicked into place. "You miserable son of a bitch."

Ignoring him, the scientist continued, pride exuding from his demeanor. This fucking doomsday weapon was obviously his baby, and he was proud of it. "We gutted one of the cargo holds of the frigate and built some new components for the weapon. It was a simple matter, really. The machine seats fifty, all strapped in tight. They're hooked up by their amp jacks, and when the weapon arms, it siphons all of the energy it needs directly from people like you. An unfortunate side effect of this is the death of all of the biotics. But space is big, and a few floating bodies will hardly clutter it at all."

Kaidan almost felt sick. It was like fucking ritual sacrifice. They'd killed fifty people in order to fire the damn thing, let alone all the people who died on the planet. He was distantly aware of screaming to his left and realized it was another L2 being tested. Christ.

"Is that fear I see, Kaidan?" Vargan asked smugly. "It's scary, isn't it? Knowing that you're going to be hooked up to a very painful machine, and that your death will destroy your homeworld."

"You're a sadistic fuck," Alenko replied. "And I can promise you that you're going to die within the next twenty-four hours."

The Turian laughed mockingly. "You can promise me? On what basis can you make that promise?"

As if on cue, a shrill, blaring alarm sounded. Mihra Alnatus' cultured yet cold voice spoke over an intercom. "Attention all personnel," she said. "We have intruders on level 1, repeat, intruders on level 1. All level 1 personnel are to assist in stopping the intruders. All critical staff for the _Graviton_ are to report to the hangar immediately."

The guards immediately began herding the L2s out of the room, out another set of double doors than they'd entered through. No doubt the _Graviton _was in that direction.

Kaidan made brief eye contact with Vargan before he was shoved towards the doors. "That basis, motherfucker," he replied.


	15. Anatomy of a Mass Murderer

Hello everyone! I heartily apologize for my long absence! It's been a while I know, but hopefully things will pick up now. Please note that by the time of the next chapter's publication, Redemption will be changed to a different, as yet undecided title; this is because there's an official comic miniseries coming out with that name, bridging the gap between ME1 and ME2, and I heartily wish to avoid getting sued. Anyways, special thanks to R-I-C-A-R-D and an extra special thanks to Zing-baby. Without further adue, here's Chapter 15!

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Chapter 15: Anatomy of a Mass Murderer

_I've got nothing left to choose, so I think I'll go insane. - Megadeth_

Shepard spun out of her cover, firing a burst at the thugs down the corridor, before ducking back behind the corner. Garrus fired his pistol in rapid succession, keeping the man who'd shown up behind them pinned behind his cover. Things were going about as well as could be expected. The two of them had come under fire within a minute or two after leaving LaRue in his final resting place. They soldiered on through the sterile white corridors of the facility, making their way towards the armory, Wrex's holding cell, and the elevator into the sublevels of the base.

Between the two of them, they'd killed around a dozen mercs, but the bastards seemed to be in ample supply. The pair around the corner from her had cover behind corners of their own; the base was strange in design, full of twisting corridors and multiple paths. She supposed logistically this had something to do with the formation of the mountain and the facilitation of the damn thing opening up to let ships in, but it was a pain in the ass.

She was getting tired. Her lack of armor, combined with the injuries she'd sustained in the fistfight, made firefights a tricky proposition. The slightest grazing gunshot wound would be an almost insurmountable problem in her present state, so she fought with utmost caution.

She spun out from around the corner again. A quick squeeze of the trigger caught a merc in the head as he peaked out from his cover. Suddenly Garrus was there, priming a grenade and hurling it down the hallway towards the other merc. A quick glance back told Shepard that he had killed his own target, and that for the moment, their six was all clear. The grenade exploded and its intended target screamed his last.

"Clear," she said, waving him down the hall as she watched their six.

"Clear!" Garrus called from down the corridor. She sprinted to his position. "The armory should be nearby," the Turian remarked. She nodded wordlessly, and leapfrogged past him, heading left around the corner, past the dead mercs.

A noise to her right caused her to spin around, but it was too late. A big Krogan mercenary slammed into her, knocking her against the wall. Her rifle clattered to the floor. Shit! Her damned eye had only gotten worse as they'd progressed, and she'd missed the door on her right as a result of her reduced peripheral vision. Garrus unloaded on the big goliath, but the alien seemed to shrug the slugs off as an annoyance, lifting the commander up with one massive hand. She plunged her thumb into his eye, landing gracefully as he dropped her, hand reaching for his enormous head. Scooping up her rifle, she unloaded into the big creature, holding the trigger down until orange blood painted the walls behind him. The Krogan toppled to the floor with an enormous impact.

"Christ," she muttered. "Garrus, take point. My eye is becoming a liability."

The Turian nodded. So it went for another couple of minutes; seven more mercs came at them, and they were all put down with extreme prejudice. Finally, they came to the door of the armory. Shepard scanned the hallway as Garrus hacked the door panel, and stepped inside as the door slid open. To her delight, her Colossus hardsuit sat in a rack with a number of low-end, male models. This armor was her pride and joy, with an integrated medical system, enhanced shield banks, and motorized joints that would allow her to dent a fucking tank with a good enough punch. Shit was about to get interesting.

* * *

The council sat in their chamber, minus the Asari, who had retired for the evening early, their faces ashen with the news that they'd just received from the _Normandy_. The transmission had been patched through directly into the room; they'd sat there as Presley, the vessel's XO, informed them that Vakarian had contacted the ship to tell them that the mission was a SNAFU. The Turian Spectre was alone, and the rest of the shore party was either dead or captive. He told them that he would try to rectify the situation and contact them when he was able. That had been twelve hours ago, and the frigate had heard no word since. They'd waited to call the Citadel, to minimize the risk of the transmission being intercepted by the enemy, but after twelve hours, Presley had made the tough decision of making the call.

Anderson sat in his chair, tapping his fingers absentmindedly on the table as the Turian and Salarian discussed their course of action. He was at a loss for how to proceed. His initial instinct was to try and stonewall the other councilors; Shepard got things done. Shepard didn't fail. If the remaining members of the council saw fit, they could order actions that might compromise Shepard's ability to do her job. Namely, Anderson was worried that they might try to order the _Normandy_ to do what they could to nuke Mernea. This course of action didn't particularly appeal to the human councilor; the best case scenario if it was ordered was that Shepard, Alenko, and the others would all die horribly. The worst case scenario was that the _Normandy_ would fail to escape the blast and _everyone_ would die.

He hated both of these possibilities passionately; he felt responsible for everyone down there, much more so than his colleagues. Shepard was his protégé; she might as well have been his daughter. The thought of ordering her destruction sickened him. It went even beyond the bond he shared with the commander; the _Normandy _had been _his _ship once, however briefly. He knew everyone aboard the vessel, had hand selected its crew. Needless to say, he was personally invested in the survival of the commander, the ship, and her crew.

At the same time, he wasn't sure he could rightfully try to stall his colleagues; things were certainly dire, and the presence of an Alliance strike team probably hadn't helped them with the deadline; if anything, the terrorists might have moved their timetable ahead in retaliation. Anderson felt certain that Earth would be the next target, and he had an obligation to the billions of people whose interests and hopes were his to protect. If giving his friends more time meant the destruction of most of the human race, could he really give them more time?

"Councilor Anderson," the Turian said. "Your opinion on my suggestion?"

Anderson snapped to attention. "I'm sorry," he replied. "I didn't catch that."

The Turian shook his head in minor exasperation. "I said I suggest we order the _Normandy_ to commence nuclear bombardment." There it was. Anderson sighed. He paused, searching for the words.

The door swung open and the Asari councilor rushed in. "I've done some digging," she said in her voice weathered and upset, not at all possesing the demure quality they were used to. "I discovered who Mihra Alnatus is."

* * *

Mihra Alnatus was furious. She'd rushed to the security room as soon as the officer on duty there had contacted her. It seemed that somehow Vargan and his men had overlooked the presence of a Turian commando. The security feed showed this new development and Shepard running free through her complex. She'd immediately given the order to prep the Graviton for immediate launch, just in case her men failed to stop the intruders. She doubted it would come to that, but at this stage of the game, she would not be denied her ultimate victory.

Earlier, she'd been scouring the extranet for any reference to her work, and had been disappointed to see that nothing had been leaked to the press regarding her hand in the destruction of Thessia. She wanted people to know. She wanted the galaxy to see who was in control, to show people that the power the council exercised was all smoke and mirrors. For too long the status quo had remained intact. For too long a small group of inept statesmen had called the shots. The power didn't belong to people such as them. The power belonged to people with the strength and the will to claim it.

Her early life had been spent clinging to the status quo, clinging to the conventions that had been set forth by people lacking in vision. She'd been a good little Asari; she'd scored high in her commando training, and well was on her way to traditional, brainwashed productivity. One fateful day eighty-four years ago, she'd been assigned to bring down a Turian arms dealer. Her unit failed miserably, walking into an ambush in a cavern on the uncharted world they'd tracked him to. All with the help of a few old combat drones, he'd made mincemeat of an elite team of commandos. But not her.

She woke up some time after the battle; her first sight upon awakening was the arms dealer, Parank. Why had he spared her, she'd asked him weakly. He told her that he bore her no ill will. He had killed her companions because they'd sought to kill him, and he'd commenced nursing her back to health because she'd no longer been in a position to harm him. He wasn't in the business of killing unconscious young women (ironic: she was nearly a century older than him), particularly ones as pretty as her.

So began her education. He continued to nurse her back to health over the following, and proved a compelling conversationalist. She was fascinated by this Turian, powerful yet compassionate. The things he said made a great deal of sense. He didn't see himself as a death dealer. He saw himself as an enemy of convention. If people were discontent with the status quo, who was he to withhold the means of resistance from them?

This was wrong, she argued. The system was for the benefit of all. The council was a tried and true institution, put in place for the benefit of all. Dissenters weren't acting with the common good in mind.

"The benefit of all? I think you'll have trouble finding a Krogan who agrees. Or a rachni, though you probably wouldn't even be able to find one to ask. My point is that the council acts in its own interests; what if my interests and the council's conflict? The council will exert its authority over me and my interests will be stifled. What makes the council right? What makes their needs more valid than my own, or of anyone's? They have the power. That's why. They've no divine entitlement to rule. Their rule is only just from a certain point of view. I have a different point of view, but I don't have the power. The question is, how does one attain power?"

So it continued. She'd been enraptured by his teachings, as if her previous life had been one long sleep and now she'd awoken into a world of limitless freedom and possibility. She'd stayed with Parank, become his lover. The council continued to send people after him, but he was always a step ahead. She became pregnant with his child, and gavebirth to a beautiful young asari. It was the happiest she'd ever been. Parank was a loving mate, and a devoted father. Nothing had ever made sense to her like his philosophies. She had been deeply, totally in love with him. Then tragedy struck.

* * *

"We received intel that the arms dealer was en route to a deal in the Horse Head Nebula when we found him. Our ship opened fire and scored a direct hit to the port side of the hull. Moments later an escape pod was jettisoned onto the nearby planet, which the Spectre on the case calculated would touch down a few miles outside of a large mining colony," the Asari councilor continued. "We couldn't concern ourselves with the pod; we knew that Haleah, as she was then known, was likely on it, and we were more concerned with Parank. He gave them a good chase, but they eventually were able to score a direct hit to his engines and board the vessel. He killed most of the Asari commandos sent aboard, but hadn't reckoned on a Spectre. That was that."

"They immediately headed for where the pod had crashed, and were met with a rather disturbing find. A dead child lay inside the pod, killed by injuries that were presumably sustained after the first shots had hit Parank's vessel. Haleah was nowhere to be found. We suspected at the time that she'd stowed away a mining vessel. Now it seems we know the truth. She reconstructed her identity and worked her way up the ranks of Hamalah Security, biding her time. I recognized her face. It took me a long time to make the connection but…oh Goddess, this was our fault!"

The Asari councilor let out a racking sob, and the Turian put a comforting hand on her shoulder. Anderson let the implications sink in, a growing sense of dread building in him. He didn't want to consider the fact that they might all be screwed, but a little voice within him told him it was starting to look that way.

* * *

That had been the worst day of her life. She'd been tucking her child in to bed when the blast struck their ship. The ship shook with impact, knocking her to the floor. She lay there for a moment, dazed and stunned, when the shriek of her child shook her out of it. Little Mihra had been thrown from her bed, and head crashing against a wall with an agonizing thud. Haleah rushed to her, dismayed to find her already unconscious. Lifting the limp form of her little girl, she sprinted to the cockpit, where Parank sat, frantically working the controls. Their final goodbye was painfully brief. He told her to remember what he'd taught her, that his death might have meaning. He kissed little Mihra on the forehead and had one last embrace with his lover, and then sent them to the escape pod.

Haleah discovered in the pod that the impact with the wall had killed her daughter. Head trauma. Her beloved would die soon. What did she have to live for? She made her decision in that pod, the decision that had determined the rest of her life. She was going to shake things up. She was going to do it in a big way. The status quo was going to change. And the council would burn.

She'd taken the name of her poor, dead child and added an arbitrary surname to it, and gone about establishing her new identity: upstanding security chief. All the while, she snooped around for opportunities: men of vision, financiers, and soldiers. She'd found everything she needed. Kasparov's ideas for weaponizing element zero were nothing short of brilliant; Faraday was a billionaire entrepreneur who'd been easily swayed by Kasparov's falsified presentation of his theories. Additionally, the man wasn't remotely cautious with his money, allowing her to hire her private army after the facility had been constructed. Then they'd begun gathering resources, abducting biotics.

It had all been rather simple really. It just went to show how bloated and complacent the council and their flunkies really were. They caught criminals all the time for simple, relatively meaningless offenses. Drug dealers, gang members, and cults were taken out with utmost efficiency. But she, right under their nose, had set up the most sophisticated criminal operation ever devised with the singular intent of seizing their power. And she was going to win.


End file.
